Beard Care 101: Grooming Ingredients to Avoid

An Extensive List of Beard Care Ingredients to Avoid

As more guys are proudly growing out their beards, the beard care industry is more popular than ever before. This means that lots of new companies are popping up with their own unique formulations so that they can get in on all of that profit potential. Now, there is a downside to having a variety to choose from when it comes to beard care products. As we’re sure you already know, not all beard care products are created equally.

When it comes to the quality, effectiveness, and health level of a particular beard care product, what matters is the ingredients. After all, a beard care product is only as good as the ingredients that it contains, no matter what the company promises that it can achieve for your facial hair and skin.

What makes one ingredient better than another?

Well, we’ll be helping you out by providing a list of commonly used beard care ingredients that you should avoid at all costs. All of these ingredients can be found in lots of beard oils, balms, cleansers, and the like, despite the fact that they’ve been shown to be less than ideal for your skin, facial hair, and overall health.

Why all beard care products are not created equally?

So, if some ingredients are better than others, and some are straight out bad for you, why do companies use them? Well, the sad reality is that the beard care industry is full of brands that care more about their profits than your well-being. See, cheap, harsh synthetic ingredients, like the ones listed above, are far cheaper in terms of cost than healthy, high-quality ingredients that are derived straight from organically grown plants. Therefore, companies that aren’t too concerned with maintaining high quality are going to choose the cheaper ingredients every time.

Ingredients to Avoid

Now, let’s break down the worst offenders in the beard care and skincare game.

Ingredient #1: Sulfates

Sulfates, such as sodium lauryl sulfate, are harsh stripping agents that are most often found in cleansing products like beard shampoos and beard soaps. You know that incredible lather that you get when you use certain shampoos and soap products? Well, that lather is coming from sulfates. And, while it may make you feel like the product is really working, that lather has nothing to do with how much it’s cleansing your facial hair. In fact, sulfates do remove dirt and oil from the hair, but they also remove moisture, leaving you with a vulnerable, dry beard and dehydrated skin.

Ingredient #2: Parabens

Parabens are extremely common in skincare and beard care products, because they’re a cheap preservative that can extend the shelf life of a particular formulation. While parabens do work as preservatives, this comes at a cost. When absorbed into the bloodstream through topical application, parabens can disrupt the hormonal balance that’s essential to our overall health.

Ingredient #3: Aluminum

Aluminum is a toxic metal that should not be applied to your skin and facial hair daily. It’s known as a hormone disruptor due to the way in which it behaves like estrogen when absorbed into the bloodstream through the skin. This can throw your entire hormonal balance out of whack, not to mention bring down those levels of testosterone that are crucial to healthy and fast beard growth.

Ingredient #4: Synthetic Fragrances

When you see “synthetic fragrances” listed on a product’s label, this likely means that the aroma of the product comes from a variety of synthetic chemicals that are more often than not derived from petroleum. The thing about synthetic fragrances is that they can be extremely irritating. Many of us are actually allergic to synthetic fragrances, which means that daily application can lead to beard hair loss and skin-related ailments.

Ingredient #5: Propylene Glycol (PG)

Propylene glycol is found in a lot of skincare products, and it’s derived from alcohol. While this ingredient isn’t necessarily harmful to a person’s health, it can weaken the proteins of the skin that keep it elastic, supple, and wrinkle-free as a person ages. This is due to the aggressive way in which it pushes through the pores to enter the deeper layers of the skin. Additionally, many people are allergic to propylene glycol in topical applications.

Ingredient #6: Urea

Urea is a common ingredient in skin and beard care ingredients. It acts as a preservative while helping the consistency of formula be more absorbent. The problem is that urea can be an endocrine disruptor that can change the way in which your hormones balance each other out, and this can lead to a host of unwanted symptoms.

Ingredient #7: Phthalates

Another commonly used category of ingredients is phthalates, which are most often used as solvents. This is another class of synthetic chemicals that can do damage to the internal organs when enough of it absorbs through the skin and into the bloodstream. Phthalates seem to be difficult for the kidneys and liver to process, which can ultimately lead to compromised function of these organs.

Ingredient #8: Silicones

Silicones are slippery ingredients that are found in many moisturizing products for the skin and beard. They help give the facial hair a glossy appearance and make both the beard and skin feel very soft and smooth. The problem with silicones is that they sit on the top layer of the skin and beard, meaning that they’re only providing moisture superficially while preventing more moisture from getting in where it’s most needed.

Ingredient #9: Siloxanes

Siloxanes are moisturizing ingredients that are synthetic in nature. Like many other ingredients on this list, they can act as endocrine disruptors.

Ingredients Used by The Bearded Bastard

Now that you know about the many potentially harmful ingredients that are often found in beard care ingredients, you can better appreciate how we at the Bearded Bastard go to enormous lengths to avoid synthetic ingredients altogether. Our organic, all-natural formulations don’t just have the potential to improve the state of your beard, but they’re also far less likely to cause internal health issues as a result of frequent use.

Ingredients That Truly Make a Difference 

If you want to give your skin and facial hair only the very best that nature has to offer, it’s beyond crucial that you thoroughly look through the list of ingredients on the label of a beard care product. Now, you can easily determine whether or not a beard care product is right for you, as we’ve given you a solid list of ingredients to completely avoid.