Opinion: DIY beauty products cheaper, better for environment

Kayla Byler
Wed, 15 Jan 2014 04:17:37 +0000
Opinion, beauty, cosmetics, DIY, hair, shampoo

At a Target store in downtown Minneapolis, beauty concierge Chelsea Mathison helped Bethany Miller find a natural beauty product. Credit: Courtesy of MCT

I haven’t used shampoo in almost two weeks. My shower isn’t broken, I’m not a crazy hippie and I’m not trying to prove a point. I just think it’s stupid to spend money on beauty products.

Prices on things like shampoo, makeup and hair products are sky high and it’s ridiculous because all of these things are unnecessary. That’s why this year as my New Year’s resolution, I vowed to go 365 days without buying a beauty product. Don’t freak out when I say that like my mom did when I told her. I’m still going to get essential things like soap and deodorant. However for the next year I will not buy shampoo, any kind of makeup or hair product.

I’ve done some research and found do-it-yourself alternatives for almost every beauty product you could ever want, and most of them are cheaper, better for the environment and work just as well as the store-bought kind. I’ve been experimenting with an alternative way of washing your hair and so far it has been working out great. I’ve even gotten compliments.

Simply, I just disagree that society has these types of standards, especially for women. It’s expected that we should take such extreme measures to make ourselves conform to a commercialized beauty. If no one wore makeup, everyone would just be used to what a normal (beautiful) human face looks like. If images of women used in the media weren’t manipulated to create this idealized, perfect feminine figure, then we would all stop striving for it. We would be happier with ourselves and have more money.

So this year I decided to start with myself and show those around me that this is what I look like and that I’m completely happy with it.