As requires transparency in meals manufacturing intensify, pushed by figures akin to RFK Jr. and the Make America Wholesome Once more (MAHA) motion, the cosmetics and private care business is making ready for related scrutiny. States are already advancing restrictions on components and packaging.
For instance, California’s PFAS-Free Magnificence Act (AB 2771) took impact on January 1, 2025, banning cosmetics and private care merchandise that comprise deliberately added PFAS, following a related ban applied in Vermont final yr.
Colorado, Maryland, Minnesota, Oregon, and Washington even have laws taking impact this yr or at the moment in progress to deal with PFAS in beauty merchandise, making a patchwork of compliance obligations throughout key markets.
On the federal stage, oversight can also be increasing. Underneath MoCRA, U.S. Meals and Drug Administration (FDA) should assess using PFAS in cosmetics and publish its findings by December 29, 2025. These developments coincide with a wave of state legal guidelines on packaging, together with Prolonged Producer Duty (EPR) applications akin to SB 54 and recycled content material mandates, that are reshaping materials decisions and exposing corporations to new compliance and enforcement dangers.
Towards this backdrop, CosmeticsDesign U.S. spoke with Holland & Knight companions Rachel Gartner and Meaghan Colligan Hembree, who advise main magnificence and private care producers on FDA, environmental, and sustainability compliance.
Gartner has in depth expertise offering strategic recommendation on meals, dietary dietary supplements, cosmetics, and different FDA-regulated merchandise. She collaborates with corporations at each step of the product growth course of to judge components, formulations, and assess potential dangers based mostly on present and rising FDA coverage.
Hembree advises shoppers on complicated regulatory compliance points and disputes throughout your complete life cycle of chemical compounds, wastes, and merchandise, together with product stewardship, advertising and marketing, distribution, use, compliance, allowing, importation, contamination and spills administration, and end-of-life administration. She offers strategic, business-focused counsel to shopper product corporations, together with manufacturers, producers, distributors, and retailers concerned within the cosmetics, attire, textile, chemical, transportation, and meals and beverage industries.
On this CDU Q&A, Gartner and Hembree focus on the converging dangers dealing with the business and the proactive steps corporations can take to arrange for heightened regulatory consideration.
CDU: What indicators or patterns are you seeing that counsel a regulatory or advocacy highlight is popping towards cosmetics and private care merchandise?
Rachel Gartner: The MAHA motion is empowered by the buyer’s want for transparency. With this in thoughts, I believe producers of all shopper merchandise, no matter their regulatory classification, needs to be enthusiastic about what meaning for his or her enterprise.
Customers need entry to info, together with details about what’s of their merchandise and the way these merchandise are made. We’ve seen a deal with meals – ingestible merchandise – issues we put in our physique. It could be prudent for corporations that promote merchandise we put on and round our our bodies to be enthusiastic about the scrutiny their merchandise might face throughout this administration.
Meaghan Colligan Hembree: From an environmental and product stewardship perspective, I’m seeing regulators develop their deal with publicity pathways to your complete product lifecycle—together with ingredient sourcing, manufacturing practices, advertising and marketing disclosures, and end-of-life packaging administration. Customers additionally wish to perceive the environmental and chemical publicity impacts of their merchandise and packaging.
Integrating strong chemical compliance and ESG analysis—to incorporate ingredient, packaging, and carbon footprint assessments—positions corporations to each meet regulatory expectations and authentically differentiate themselves in a crowded market. Collaboration between authorized, sustainability, and product groups is more and more important to anticipate and tackle these overlapping areas of scrutiny.
CDU: Are you able to elaborate on what is supposed by a “heightened ingredient threat” on this context? Are there specific components or courses of components that producers needs to be paying particularly shut consideration to presently?
Rachel Gartner: Substances which have historic controversy or questionable security information are on the biggest threat. Proper now, we’re counseling shoppers to get a superb deal with on their product formulations and the protection information to assist them.
It’s vital to contemplate issues like, how latest is the protection information? Have there been more moderen research that contradict the prior place?
Does the protection information align with the product’s use? And never simply the way in which you market the product, the supposed use, however the way in which you perceive customers are interacting with the product?
Meaghan Colligan Hembree: Complementing Rachel’s deal with security information, I’d add that from an environmental and product stewardship perspective, regulators are zeroing in on components in packaging and merchandise related to endocrine disruption, carcinogenicity, and environmental persistence—akin to PFAS, phthalates, and sure plastics. These substances are more and more topic to bans or reporting necessities below state, federal, and worldwide environmental legal guidelines.
This implies corporations should not solely audit their ingredient lists for security, but in addition for compliance with evolving “banned” and “reportable” chemical lists. Staying forward of those necessities is important to keep away from provide chain disruptions and regulatory penalties.
This twin strategy—combining product security and environmental stewardship—will assist manufacturers keep forward of each regulatory and reputational dangers.
CDU: In relation to packaging, you’ve recognized a rising rigidity between security and sustainability. How are regulators and customers at the moment evaluating this tradeoff, and what dangers are corporations dealing with in the event that they don’t get forward of the difficulty?
Meaghan Colligan Hembree: I’m advising shoppers that packaging choices now sit on the intersection of compliance, security, and ESG technique. With the rise of specific chemical bans in packaging and merchandise, Prolonged Producer Duty (EPR), and recycled content material legal guidelines, manufacturers should consider not simply the recyclability and chemical content material of packaging, but in addition the accuracy of sustainability claims.
Authorized publicity can come up from misaligned or unsubstantiated claims, whereas reputational threat is heightened by shopper and investor scrutiny of greenwashing and using controversial supplies. Proactive steps embrace conducting packaging materials assessments, guaranteeing claims are substantiated with information, and integrating these issues into broader ESG and compliance frameworks.
This holistic strategy helps corporations handle each regulatory and market expectations.
CDU: You’ve labored intently with corporations on lifecycle compliance throughout ingredient sourcing, formulation, packaging, and labeling. The place are manufacturers most weak at the moment from a authorized or reputational standpoint?
Rachel Gartner: I work with a pleasant combine of huge strategics and smaller start-ups. Either side of the spectrum rely closely on their co-manufacturing companions for sourcing, formulation growth, manufacturing, and many others.
My start-up shoppers are sometimes extra weak on the authorized points that include these partnerships, as a result of they don’t all the time have the previous learnings or leverage on the negotiation desk. Nevertheless, my bigger shoppers appear to have extra threat from a reputational standpoint – there’s extra to lose if their companion doesn’t do the proper factor.
For that reason, amongst others, it’s important to search out good companions. Alongside the authorized points, we are sometimes discussing gadgets that current PR threat to the model.
On this age of social media, my shoppers are positively and negatively impacted by issues mentioned on and throughout the assorted platforms. If good content material will get picked up, it may be nice for the model. On the flipside, if dangerous content material goes viral, it may be catastrophic.
There may be an artwork to navigating these conditions. I all the time suggest shoppers have a go-to PR group, whether or not it’s in-house or with a third-party company.
Meaghan Colligan Hembree: On the environmental aspect of lifecycle compliance, I deal with how lifecycle compliance intersects with chemical bans, packaging necessities, and ESG and sustainability commitments. With the speedy growth of chemical reporting legal guidelines—akin to these requiring disclosure of deliberately added PFAS or different precedence substances—a key vulnerability is the failure to establish and report the presence of newly regulated chemical compounds in merchandise or packaging.
Further vulnerabilities usually come up when there’s a disconnect between what’s occurring operationally—akin to chemical administration, waste dealing with, or packaging decisions—and what’s being communicated to stakeholders. Missteps in chemical security disclosures or inaccurate recyclability claims can set off enforcement actions and damaging publicity.
I work with shoppers to develop built-in compliance applications that tackle not solely regulatory necessities (e.g., waste, allowing, chemical reporting) but in addition align with investor and shopper expectations for transparency and accountability. This usually entails cross-functional collaboration to make sure that authorized, sustainability, and communications groups are aligned and ready for evolving regulatory and reputational challenges.
CDU: What concrete steps can magnificence and private care product producers take proper now to strengthen transparency and cut back threat throughout their provide chains, notably in mild of potential future regulation or litigation?
Rachel Gartner: I’m encouraging shoppers to share the “why” behind their manufacturers. By providing customers training on the merchandise, I hope they’ll begin to admire the aim behind using sure components, packaging supplies, and many others.
Additionally, to get a superb deal with on the continued secure use of these things and develop sturdy positions as to why some issues ought to stay unchanged, and in parallel, researching enough alternate options which may resonate higher with the trendy shopper.
Meaghan Colligan Hembree: I encourage shoppers to deal with transparency as a core governance difficulty below ESG reporting — along with a shopper engagement device. Meaning totally documenting ingredient security information, packaging supplies, chemical compounds topic to present or anticipated bans, and environmental impacts to make sure claims are substantiated.
We’re serving to corporations develop techniques that allow clear, correct reporting and combine that information into their ESG frameworks. This type of proactive compliance will help mitigate future litigation threat and construct belief with each regulators and customers.
CDU: Given the present momentum round transparency, sustainability, and shopper security, do you imagine the FDA or different federal businesses are more likely to develop their enforcement deal with cosmetics within the close to future? What sorts of modifications may producers count on if that occurs?
Rachel Gartner: Sure. I believe we’ll see motion on the federal stage from FDA, but in addition, on the state stage – notably in these consumer-focused jurisdictions.
We’re more likely to see related proposed modifications/bans to components and packaging for beauty merchandise as properly. It could be prudent for producers to begin assessing their components and the protection information to assist the use of their present formulations.
Meaghan Colligan Hembree: By way of the environmental and product stewardship aspect of issues, enforcement focus will proceed to develop, notably round chemical components and packaging compliance below legal guidelines like California’s Safer Client Merchandise and the rising wave of EPR laws. I count on to see a continued growth of chemical-specific reporting necessities, warnings, bans, and necessary reporting regimes at each the state and federal ranges.
Producers ought to put together for extra frequent updates to “prohibited” and “reportable” chemical lists, and for elevated scrutiny of compliance with these necessities. Producers ought to anticipate tighter rules and put together by conducting complete threat assessments and aligning their merchandise and packaging with evolving product, authorized, and ESG requirements.
