How To Minimize Waste In A Beauty Salon: Use A Wholesaler Committed To Sustainability

Buying eco-friendly salon products is good. But green packaging & shipping is better.

Getting earth-friendly in your personal life is a process–but sustainability in a salon? It’s a whole different challenge. Anyone who has run a hair, massage, or esthetics salon knows the struggle to manage the business’s day-to-day impact on the planet.

You’re juggling having enough product variety to meet your customer needs. But not so much to generate a ton of waste. How do you find the balance between not having extras and not running out of what you need?

You want to use products that aren’t going to pollute the environment or be toxic to your clients. Yet you need your products to actually work!

That’s not to mention the sanitation side of what you do. You’re not just cleaning between clients–you’re managing lots of disposables. For many services, reusable items aren’t an option. Many state laws and county public departments require you to use disposables for certain products, such as toe separators and tub liners.

You can only do your best when it comes to running a sustainable salon. But one thing that reduces your carbon footprint is knowing your wholesaler is as on board with being eco-friendly as they can be. Your orders have a huge impact! Wholesalers can be notoriously bad at offering eco-friendly salon products with sustainable shipping and packaging. If you’ve ever unwrapped loads of plastic off a shipment from far away, you know.

At blinc, we’re on a constant journey to provide retail cosmetics that are as eco-conscious as possible. Of course, without sacrificing sanitation and product effectiveness! 

Here are steps we’ve taken to improve our earth-conscious practices. Has your wholesale cosmetics retailer taken these steps?

1. We package products with easy-to-recycle materials. 

Using recyclable shipping containers certainly helps reduce your carbon footprint. But if the materials are hard-to-process for reuse…they’re often thrown away for convenience. For example, the recycling process for glass takes quite a bit of energy.  Even though it’s highly recyclable, more than ⅔ of glass produced gets thrown away.

Aluminum is an excellent alternative–it’s lighter and 100% recyclable. However, if it’s mixed with other materials, it becomes much more involved to recycle. And the harder it is to process, the more likely it will get thrown away.

The blinc B2B is moving away from materials with aluminum components for that reason. Right now, we’re integrating more and more post-consumer resin (PCR) plastics. These plastics get new life AND require less energy, water, and fossil fuels to get there. We’re always willing to look into alternatives as better materials come out.

2. We give pre-used materials a second life. 

Getting sustainable packaging for products needing top-notch sanitation (like cosmetics) is tricky. Glass and aluminum bottles are often sealed with plastic film for hygiene. But a great way to meet the sanitation requirements and sustainability is using recycled post-consumer materials.

Previously used cardboard is an easy way for companies to promote reusability–both for their shipping containers and their product boxes. Check to see if your wholesaler uses Forest Stewardship Certified (FSC) paper for its packaging. At blinc, we use FSC paper because it’s the gold standard for environmentally conscious and sustainable packaging.

Another option is using plastics made from PCR plastics, as we mentioned before. Unfortunately, they often don’t qualify for getting recycled again, but it’s an excellent material for products that need to be sanitary and well-sealed.

The combo of FSC paper and PCR plastics for packaging has another perk–it reduces the shipping weight. This helps reduce carbon emissions while shipping.

3. We make & distribute products close to home.

The shipping industry puts out a staggering 940 million tons of CO2 a year. And 90% of what we consume is moved across the ocean.

Clearly, this huge product-shipping distance is a stain on a wholesale order’s eco-friendliness. Even if an overseas product is made with eco-friendly materials and packaging–the carbon footprint of a product’s shipping can’t be ignored.

Buying items with less travel distance is an excellent way to reduce those travel emissions. If you run your salon in the United States, and you purchase wholesale in the US, you can know your order’s trip didn’t have to go overseas. If your wholesaler’s salon products are also made in the US (as blinc’s are), that’s even better.

4. We’re always working toward CLEAN formulas. 

One of the best ways to be eco-friendly is by taking care of ourselves! Putting unsafe ingredients on our bodies puts them into the environment when they’re washed off–or deep in our bodies if they’re absorbed.

What ingredients are in the products you buy wholesale? Any good wholesaler will disclose the ingredients for your knowledge. Getting beauty product formulas to be clean–yet still effective–is an ongoing process. But a good sign that a manufacturer is taking steps to clean formulas is by intentionally not using problematic ingredients. It’s also a good sign when a manufacturer discloses ingredients that are less than 1% of the formula.

At blinc, we work to make every formula as clean as possible. You can check out our NO List to explore what ingredients we significantly limit or completely avoid.

5. Small wholesale orders are available. 

There’s no need to heavily overstock your retail. But many wholesalers force you to overstock with their minimum size orders. It’s no wonder that “dead stock” or “obsolete inventory” makes up an estimated 20%-30% of the average business’ inventory! Imagine what could have been done with that space and money.

A good wholesaler will let you purchase small bulk orders if that’s all you need. Preventing overstock helps you sell products that aren’t close to expiring or losing popularity. It’s also much easier on your wallet and storage. Your budget and professional workspace need to go the distance–and overstock is a huge offender.

That’s why it's so important to us to offer small order options…both in price and in stock stize. You can purchase your cosmetic stock for as low as $150.

6. We prioritize ethical human labor & animal treatment. 

Underage workers? Unsafe working conditions? Unfair wages? Absolutely not. There is no place in today’s world for these unethical practices. Caring for the earth means caring for the humans that inhabit it.

And animals have no need to be in the cosmetics and beauty industries. Yet in one recent study, 88% of top cosmetic companies were found to fund animal testing. Don’t work with companies that test on animals or outsource testing to companies that do.

A company shouldn’t engage in unethical labor–and shouldn’t outsource parts of their business to companies that do to have them do their dirty work. One of blinc’s core values is cruelty-free cosmetic production and ethical labor practices.

Restocking for Earth Day & Working Toward a Running a Sustainable Salon?

Trying to figure out how to minimize waste in your beauty salon or massage parlor? Even small efforts in your workspace help, but the big companies you choose to use can have an even bigger impact. We encourage you to explore the sustainability efforts of the wholesalers you consider buying from.

Shopping for a wholesaler that has the longwear cosmetics your clients will love? And with transparency about its sustainability practices? blinc’s B2B offers the world’s original tubing mascara–and more–wholesale. Shop the blinc inventory your clients will love sourcing from you