Founded in 1989, Avalon Organics is a producer of bath and body care products. Formerly named Avalon Natural Products, Avalon Organics creates pure bath and body care products, without compromising the health and safety of animals or the environment. The company is inspired by organic agriculture and the ongoing cause of sustainability. Avalon Organics uses only 100% vegetarian ingredients, and it rejects all animal testing.
Avalon Organics products are formulated without parabens, harsh preservatives, synthetic fragrances, artificial colors, sodium lauryl and laureth sulfates, formaldehyde donors (e.g., diazolidinyl urea), known carcinogens, mutagens and teratogens or grapefruit seed extract. The company offers the following argument for its decision to exclude grapefruit extract from all of its products:
Grapefruit Seed Extract in its purest form is a safe and beneficial ingredient. However, many companies claim to use this ingredient alone as a preservative. It does not have the long-lasting anti-microbial effectiveness required to maintain the integrity of a personal care product when used alone. Many studies show that the true anti-microbial benefits being attributed to Grapefruit Seed Extract are due to the presence of residual synthetic preservatives within the extract.
Avalon Bath and Body products are created with what the company calls “science-based nutrients,” as well as natural botanicals. Ingredients such as organic essential oils and organic plant oils help to provide superior natural products, while producing a “measurable expansion of organic acreage cultivation”.
In addition to providing products that help to preserve the environment, Avalon Organics’ own working environment helps to save the planet, and it is one that encourages giving back through volunteer work. Roughly 28% of the company’s employees do volunteer work in the community. This means Avalon Organics supports 48 non-profit organizations. Avalon Organics’ office and warehouse are 100% solar powered, the company has a comprehensive reduce, reuse, recycle policy (and practices) in place, it recycles printer cartridges, bottles and cans – giving proceeds to non-profits, it purchases and reuses recycled office paper with 35% post-consumer content, and it uses recycled paper for all printed promotion materials.
And finally, Avalon Organics does not stop at saving the environment and providing vegetarian, cruelty-free products to its customers. The company is also the creator of the Avalon Organics Heroes Challenge –a $50,000 matching grant to benefit the Breast Cancer Fund.
Avalon Organics bath and body products
Avalon Organics offers bath and shower products, soaps, shave products, lotions, fragrance free body care products, cleansers, toners, moisturizers, intensives, and a line called “COQ10,” “Lavender” and “Vitamin C.” The company also produces shampoos, conditioners and fragrance free hair care products, as well as products for baby, such as cleansers, moisturizers and skin protection.
Avalon Organics vegetarian ethic and what it means
As stated earlier, all Avalon Organic products are 100% vegetarian. The company makes maximum use of ingredients derived from natural plant sources, including vegetable and nut oils, plant waxes, herbal extracts and pure essential oils. The company rejects ingredients that are by-products of the meat and fishing industry such as gelatin, tallow, collagen, elastin, squalene and others. Avalon also rejects all cruelly obtained animal ingredients such as musk, castoreum and cochineal (carmine).
While, the vegetarian ethic allows for the use of humanely derived milk, honey, beeswax and lanolin, only a very limited number of Avalon Organics products contain one of these ingredients. This means that the following products do not meet vegan guidelines:
*Alba
Lipcare 18 SPF: Beeswax, Lanolin
Terra Tints: Beeswax
Sugar Cane Body Polish: Honey
*Un-Petroleum
Natural Lip Balm: Beeswax, Lanolin
Multi-Purpose Jelly: Beeswax
Avalon Organics ingredients
Avalon Organics has a long list of all natural, vegetarian and vegan ingredients that it uses in its products. For a full list of ingredients, click here. Just a few of the ingredients Avalon Organics uses include: algae, almond, aloe vera, apricot kernel oil, avocado oil, awaphui, balm mint, biotin, black pepper, burdock root, caramel, castor oil, chamomile, chlorophyll, coconut extract, ginger, oak bark, oatmeal, soy bean oil, St. Johnswort, sugar cane juice, sunflower oil, sweet almond oil, sweet orange oil, tea tree, vanilla, walnut extract, white tea, wild yam root, ylang ylang and vitamins A, B, C, E.
Where to buy Avalon Organics products
Avalon Organics products can be purchased online at www.avalonorganics.com or by phone at Natural Products Shopping 1-877-263-9456 (toll-free), Monday – Friday, 8:30 – 5:00 (CST). Products may be purchased in person at Whole Foods Market, Wild Oats, Trader Joe’s, Bread and Circus, Central Market, Chamberlains, Fresh Fields, Mrs. Greens or select GNC stores, as well as leading independent natural food retailers that carry a wide selection of Avalon Organics products.