The products you use in your skincare routine substantially impact the environment. Indeed, the cosmetics industry is currently the source of approximately 1.5% of GHG emissions.
At O’terra, your well-being, as well as that of Mother Nature, is of concern to us. For this reason, our entire O’terra product line is designed, developed and marketed to be as environmentally friendly as possible without compromising on quality!
What we do, precisely
Using natural and mostly organic ingredients
It all starts with selecting the ingredients for our products. We want the best, so we use natural ingredients, not tested on animals, and primarily organic. Opting for ingredients that are free of chemicals or synthetic products and meet high standards is a guarantee of quality for you and a concrete gesture in defence of the environment.
Indeed, did you know that many synthetic ingredients (such as silicones) have colossal polluting effects on our ecosystems since they are toxic and non-biodegradable? As a result, instead of breaking down and returning to the soil as organic matter, non-biodegradable ingredients pile up and add to solid waste.
For this reason, our O’terra products proudly bear the “animal cruelty-free” and “natural ingredients” seals. Just look at our ingredient lists, and you’ll see that none of our products contain harsh ingredients that could irritate your skin and harm biodiversity. Nature has so much to offer – let’s take advantage of it!
Offering alternatives to single-use products
Single-use products constitute a significant source of pollution and waste: that’s why we work daily to offer greener alternatives. For instance, we offer reusable makeup remover pads, reusable eye patches and reusable foot care slippers!
These greener options save tons of harmful waste that would otherwise end up in our oceans. An excellent gesture for our waterways: the second lungs of the earth.
Developing bar products
To further make a difference, we also develop bar products instead of liquid products whenever possible. As a result, we are contributing to reducing plastic waste generated by using bottles!
Every year, 8 to 9 million tons of plastic enter the world’s oceans. Thankfully, using just one bar product can replace up to 3 plastic bottles! Therefore, choosing O’terra bar products means that we don’t fill up our landfills or leave products in our ecosystems that would otherwise take over 100 years to degrade!
Moreover, to offer you quality products and increase their shelf life to reduce waste further, our bars are compacted at 150 pounds of pressure. This means they keep better, melt less quickly and stay in one piece longer than a regular bar.
Using recycled or recyclable products for our packaging
We also favor recycled and recyclable packaging! Whether it’s using recycled cardboard boxes to ship our packages or using small cloth bags to pack some of our products, we make sure to keep unnecessary and plastic packaging to a minimum.
This way, when you receive your O’terra product order, most of the packaging materials can be put in the recycling bin to give it a second life!
Planting hundreds of trees
Finally, we believe in giving back to the planet what we take from it. Therefore, the clinic commits yearly to planting a tree for each Christmas box sold. This was initiated in 2019 and is intended to minimize the environmental impact of the holiday season. Since then, several hundred trees have been planted! Last year, we even partnered with the city of Wendake to provide free trees to the town and residents who wanted to grow their own.
Rest assured, our beloved planet is at the core of all decisions regarding the design and marketing of our products!