Recently a customer of mine asked me why the ingredients on products are always in a “different” language – why can’t they just be written in plain English.
The “different” language he’s referring to is the INCI form of the ingredients. INCI stands for Ingredient Nomenclature Classification….
If you can refer back to biology class and recall that animals fall under the classifications of different species, classes and kingdoms. The same holds true for the ingredients used in cosmetics. Lavender essential oil comes from different parts of the world. There’s Bulgarian lavender (Lavandula angustifolia), French lavender (Lavandula dentate), Spanish lavender (Lavandula stoechas), and so forth. But while these may be all lavender some components are not the same. Therefore they all have a distinct name or INCI.
It’s also important for formulators to know what the INCI is for their ingredients as different suppliers can sell the same ingredients but can be comprised of different components. For example, emulsifying wax used as an emulsion in body products can be different from one supplier to another. One supplier will list it as emulsifying wax NF but another will list it as Cetearyl Alcohol (and) Polysorbate 60 . The difference in the two that they both can lend a different “feel” in an emulsified base such as lotion. They’re both good! but one may give the lotion extra “glide”.
INCI is important because it is what the FDA requires of every cosmetic product sold for the purpose of safety to consumers. We all have different reactions to different things either man-made or natural. Knowing the ingredients on the label is very important to recognize to prevent an allergic reaction.
