Greenwashing: St. Ives lotion with natural moisturizers

About two years ago, St. Ives introduced a new line of moisturizers made with "100% natural moisturizers". The website description for the Naturally Soothing oatmeal and shea butter lotion says "Non-irritating • With 100% natural moisturizers • Formulated without parabens and phthalates • Dermatologist-Tested • No Animal-Derived Ingredients • Made with natural ingredients". It lists the key ingredients as Oatmeal, Shea butter, and 100% natural moisturizers. (Link). Although it has a link that says "see all of this product's ingredients", when you click it, it shows a picture of the back of the label with the list of ingredients suspiciously absent.

The idea is to lead people to the assumption that the lotion is entirely natural, without actually claiming that it's entirely natural. Being someone who is interested in natural products, I bought some. I made the mistake of not looking at the list of ingredients until after I got home.

If you turn the bottle around and look at the ingredients, it becomes immediately obvious that these lotions are far from "100% natural".
Here are the ingredients for St. Ives 24 hour moisture lotion (copied from the back of the bottle I have on my desk, which was purchased just before they began marketing their "natural" lotions) compared with St. Ives Naturally Soothing oatmeal and shea butter lotion, with identical ingredients highlighted in red (Since St. Ives won't list them on their website, I had to find a list of ingredients on the website Paula's Choice):

St. Ives Naturally Soothing oatmeal and shea butter lotion
Water, Glycerin, Caprylic/Capric Triglyceride, Stearic Acid, Cetyl Alcohol, Mineral Oil, Cetearyl Alcohol, Urea, Butyrospermum Parkii (Shea) Butter, Avena Sativa (Oat) Meal Extract, Dimethicone, Cyclopentasiloxane, Ceteth-10 Phosphate, Dicetyl Phosphate, Carbomer, Cyclohexasiloxane, Cetearyl Glucoside, Disodium EDTA, Ethylhexylglycerin, Triethanolamine, Phenoxyethanol, Fragrance, Yellow 10, Red 40, Blue 1


St. Ives 24 hour moisture
Water, Glycerin, Caprylic/Capric Triglyceride, Cetearyl Alcohol, Cetyl Alcohol, Paraffinum Liquidum (Mineral Oil), Stearic Acid, urea, Dicetyl Phosphate, Ceteth-10 Phosphate, Cetearyl Glucoside, Triethanolamine, Dimethicone, Cyclopentasiloxane, Cyclohexasiloxane, Gelatin/Keratin Amino Acids/Lysine Hydroxypropyltrimonium Chloride, Tocopheryl Acetate,Helianthus Annuus, Chamomilla Recutita, Sambucus Nigra, Primula Veris, Butyrospermum Parkii, Propylene Glycol, Sorbitol, Stearamidopropyl Dimethylamine, Petrolatum, Olive Oil PEG-7 Esters, Sodium PCA, Disodium EDTA, Methylparaben, DMDM Hydantoin, Carbomer, Fragrance/Parfum


As you can see, the ingredients of the "100% natural" moisturizers are nearly identical to St. Ives' non-natural moisturizers. However, they are telling the truth when they say "100% natural moisturizers", as the main moisturizing ingredient is Shea Butter, and that is a natural ingredient.