Beauty’s Latest Villain: Sunscreen
These developments sheds light on a bigger problem, which is the need for more efficient SPF testing.
This edition of BEAUTY IRL is a collaborative post between myself and Arabelle Sicardi of You’ve Got Lipstick on Your Chin to cover the news surrounding K-Beauty brand Krave Beauty and conversations about sunscreen. Arabelle dives into the cultural controversy, while I cover sunscreen-related news more broadly. Thanks for reading.
Sunscreen has been riding a wave for a minute, and it’s turned into our modern-day fountain of youth for those coming of age. Today, it’s marketed as the most effective defense against aging. However, its core purpose as a protectant from sunburn or irritation remains the same.
Recently, it became widely known that lab test results of SPF in popular sunscreens made by two different K-Beauty brands — Krave Beauty and Purito — may not match SPF claims printed on the bottle, and appears to be lower. It’s incredibly important to know that sunscreen testing is flawed and spoiler alert: this controversy sheds light on a bigger problem, which is the need for more efficient SPF testing. There are a lot of separate pieces of information on various platforms, so I wanted to write a story that (hopefully) explains what’s happening. We should continue to connect dots and stay updated on this topic so that we feel up to speed when there are developments and need the context to understand them.
The underlying problems brought to the forefront by the specific brands in question make it clear this could possibly be a problem not only affecting a few brands. In addition, I’ve noticed the tendency to lump this conversation with either #stopasianhate or that all Asian sunscreens are “scamming us” — two topics I don’t even need to particularly mention to talk about this specific issue, but because of intersecting parts of culture, it all adds to how we are viewing these problems.
So here’s why this all matters.
Sunscreen has turned into more than just a required step for healthy skin. It’s now seen as the required elements of a healthy lifestyle.
And if we’re talking about content, sunscreen is one of skincare’s biggest strengths. Unlike makeup tutorials, where the satisfaction of a before and after is felt after it ends, the most immediate end-result content you can get with skincare is a dewy face. With sunscreen testing videos, you wait in anticipation to see if the typically white substance is going to disappear flawlessly onto the applier’s face. In addition, sunscreen conversations have fueled more content forms, from educational to addressing debates that pop up in comment sections. There never seems to be a shortage of content about sunscreen.
Makeup still fits into the equation. “Makeup no makeup” routines often include a robust skincare routine with a sunscreen step, and re-application methods have become more of a topic of conversation.
Due to all of this, the emotional attachment to sunscreen we now see (or feel ourselves!) is at an all-time high. Most Americans don’t wear sunscreen daily, but on special occasions such as beach days or planned, long days out in the sun.
While it makes sense that sunscreen sales saw a 17% sales decline in 2020 due to the pandemic, that’s not the full story. More Americans are using face creams, foundations, powders, and setting sprays with SPF included (those products are on the uptick, as well). Technically, this does allude to Americans slowly starting to implement SPF into their routine, even if it’s not applying the white cream as a totally separate step. Other brands have been able to shift to emphasizing claims of blue light protection from mobile phones and laptops.
The fact that American’s don’t really wear sunscreen as often as your average skincare junky doesn’t minimize the problem. Sunscreen is supposed to be regulated by the FDA as an over-the-counter drug. Therefore, it’s a misleading claim if the SPF strength is inaccurate. Faith and trust are put into product claims seen on the bottle by consumers and relayed by cosmetic chemists, scientists, dermatologists, who are naturally influential by nature of their jobs, and influencers themselves; all who take facts seriously to varying degrees and are sharing their different interpretations of information across various mediums. Who you (yes, you) decide to trust is key.
This has pushed brands to be more transparent because consumers will ask questions and hold them accountable through social media, or skincare educators will simply start to do the educating for them. In addition, there are potential long-term reputation damages that now have to be managed.
Keeping in mind all of this *waves at the air* will help you to understand why these two incidents below caused strife.
Purito & Krave Beauty
In December, INCIDecoder, an ingredient database site started by Hungary cosmetic chemist Judit Rácz, published lab results that recorded Purito’s Centella Green Level Unscented Sun to be around SPF 19, not the SPF 50+ its known to claim on the bottle. This sunscreen is a favorite among influencers, beauty writers, and beauty enthusiasts. Once INCIDecoder shared this news on its Instagram, it spread like wildfire. Purito released a statement and said they requested more testing (results they did not release), pulled the product, and offered refunds. This is important to note: International brands who want to sell sunscreen in the U.S. might remove the word “sunscreen” from the bottle so they can sell their sunscreens with UV filters that are not yet approved in the U.S. by the FDA. This is what Purito did, as well as Krave Beauty.
And here is where I talk about the United States Food and Drug Administration, which is a federal agency of the Department of Health and Human Services. Compared to over 30 approved SPF filters among Asia and Europe, America has 16. These international SPF filters are often more appealing when it comes to application and feel. Formula elegance, if you will.
The last time the FDA approved new SPF filters was 1999. In 2019, they announced that it would move forward with updating regulatory requirements for most sunscreen products in the U.S.. Korea’s Ministry of Food and Drug Safety has its own process for approving and regulating sunscreens. I highly suggest this explainer on Korean and U.S. sun care regulations by beauty writer Faith Cummings.
This month, Korean skincare brand Krave Beauty announced that it was pulling its Beet The Sun sunscreen for the same reason: faulty testing that calls into question the SPF strength. After performing independent tests as a brand and gathering results it could not disclose for legal reasons, this is what route they decided to take. Founder Liah Yoo released a video, explaining the move and why.
Yoo herself is being questioned due to her association with a Christian church that states in its Statement of Beliefs that marriage is exclusively between a man and a woman. She has addressed this as well in a now-deleted video and then a written statement, and parted ways with the church. “The fact anti-trans legislation is being pushed in a multitude of states in America by conservatives who are significantly and uniformly funded by religious conservatives. These things are interconnected, even if they are presented in a digitally native, Instagram-friendly beauty package,” writer and author Arabelle Sicardi wrote in a recent piece about the contraversy.
And in the backdrop of this are calls for the end of violence against Asian people, of which elders are largely targeted. #StopAsianHate has also sparked demand for beauty brands to address the outsized contributions of Asian brands to the Western beauty market.
Big takeaway
This has been an issue for a while, but it’s now coming to the forefront. Ultimately, small Asian-owned brands are taking on industry-wide problems that are indicative of a bigger matter. Faulty SPF lab results are not new, and its failures shed light on the need for more accurate SPF testing at a lower cost.