Lifestyle: Veganuary 2024 – 5 household non-vegan items
Vegan green cleaning company Bio-D has compiled some household products that contain hidden non-vegan ingredients to help readers through Veganuary 2024.
Plastic bags
Plastic shopping bags – as well as being bad for the planet – often contain animal fat to reduce friction and static so they’re easier to separate.
Instead, opt for reusable fabric shopping bags made from cotton or jute.
Wine
After a long day at work many of us tend to reach for a glass or two to help relax and unwind.
But wine isn’t just made from grapes. Surprisingly, many brands of wine are made using animal by-products. During its creation, wine is filtered through so-called ‘fining agents’ that are used to help the finished product look crystal clear without any particles. These can be made from bone marrow, fish oil and gelatine.
Thankfully, you can rely on these vegan-friendly wines to get through Veganuary:
Adobe Sauvignon Blanc
Cleaning products
It’s a little-known fact that many traditional household cleaning products contain as many as ten animal-derived ingredients. If you’re attempting Veganuary this January, avoid cleaning products that include the likes of:
Glycerin – typically used as a stain remover, contains rendered animal fats
Tallow – used to create soaps, derived from beef fat
Lanolin – often used in fabric softeners, this wax is secreted by wool-bearing animals like sheep
Thankfully there are now brands that avoid using ingredients derived from animal products, including green cleaning company Bio-D, which creates all of its products from plant based and naturally derived ingredients.
Clothing
We all know that clothing made from the likes of leather and fur aren’t vegan-friendly, but did you know that materials like silk, cashmere, and shearling are also culprits when it comes to creating fashion from animal products?
Whilst silk shirts and skirts are made from fibres spun by silkworms (3,000 silkworms are killed to make one pound of silk), cashmere is created from goat hair, and shearling is made from the skin and coat of a sheep or lamb.
Organic cotton is a safe bet when it comes to vegan clothes shopping. It’s also considered environmentally sustainable, as is linen, hemp, and up-and-coming sustainable vegan ‘leather’ made from pineapple leaves and cork bark.
Skincare and make-up
Whilst the use of animal testing for cosmetics and their ingredients is banned in the UK, some make-up and skincare items contain familiar ingredients that are derived from animal products such as collagen, keratin, and squalene.
The best way to make sure your chosen product is vegan is to check the packaging – most brands will make sure to let you know if it is!
For more information on Bio-D, visit www.biod.co.uk.
Photo by Daiga Ellaby on Unsplash
