Horst Rechelbacher took on the cosmetics industry in a keynote speech to open the 17th Annual HBA Global Expo and Conference in New York. The founder of Aveda and more recently, Intelligent Nutrients, called on cosmetics companies to rethink the way they formulate products, market them and even live their lives.

“It’s not about marketing a product. It’s about living a product,” he insisted.

But living a product doesn’t mean forgetting about the consumer. In his manual for Intelligent Nutrients, called Minding Your Business, Mr. Rechelbacher reminds the readers of four key points to success:
1.Help your customer meet her highest goal;
2.Give her the ability to express herself;
3.Make her feel she is part of a bigger cause; and
4.Offer the customer something of real value that she has not imagined.

One way to give the consumer something of value is to reformulate products.He called petrochemicals outdated and unsustainable and called on formulators to replace petroleum-derived materials with certified organic ingredients. The certified organic industry is surging, growing from $1 billion to $55 billion in just 10 years, according to Mr. Rechelbacher.

At the same time, he conceded that the organic landscape is confusing with an alphabet soup of certifying organizations. His company, Intelligent Nutrients, follows the U.S. Department of Agriculture standards in the U.S. and the Soil Association in the UK. But he warned the cosmetic industry to take their labels seriously or else, “Cosmetics will have warning labels like cigarettes,” he charged.

He also chastised the industry for creating lipsticks loaded with potentially toxic chemicals.

“We are putting pretty horrifying things on women’s lips,” he charged. “What you put on your lips makes its way into the bloodstream in seconds.”
Rather than end up with warning labels on their products, Mr. Rechelbacher urged cosmetics companies to use plant-based chemistry rather than synthetics in their formulations. For example, Intelligent Nutrients offers certified organic lipsticks made from fruits and seeds. The formula, according to Mr. Rechelbacher, delivers antioxidants to the body. Meanwhile, his perfumes contain essential oils.

While he conceded that attaining organic certification is difficult, it is a process that must be done. It’s all part of his overarching belief that humans are merely caretakers of the earth.

“The earth does not belong to us,” he concluded. “We belong to it and we borrow it from our children.”