by Michelle Wum

Created on: July 30, 2009

Many Americans are beginning to opt for natural and organic personal care products. These products offer a way of cleansing the body using natural minerals and ingredients and avoiding the heavy harsh chemicals used in general personal care products. These products are said to promote the natural healing processes of the body.

The US natural health and beauty care market will reach sales of $12 billion in 2014 as reported by Packaged Facts, a market research company located in New York. Even with the grey economy, the US natural products market grew 8% and neared $7 billion.

The natural personal care market seems like it will continue to perform steadily as safety concerns, disease outbreaks like H1N1, worries about pollution, green campaigns, health advocates, and the general awareness of wanting to eat and live healthily. This has also been propelled by an aging population that is trying everything in its power to stay healthy and looking young.

Many people are starting to fear the health consequences of using chemical-heavy shampoos and soap. The organic personal care products now offered by many popular and private brands promises that the natural minerals and ingredients found in their products will work together with the natural healing processes of the body instead of competing against it.

Many people don't know but some pretty weird ingredients can be found in these organic shampoo and body wash.

Here are a few:

Sodium Chloride (table salt) - table salt is a common product found in shampoo, skin cleansers, soaps, and anything that foams. Its purpose is to provide viscosity to the surface-active agents that are apparent in foaming cleansers.

Oleoresin Capsicum (pepper spray) - Many skin products that gives off a warmth or warming sensation when applied, like itch creams, muscle pain ointments contains capsicum.

Albumen (egg whites) - egg whites are very sticky and gooey, and thus acts as a perfect firming agent for the skin. Helps to keep your skin glowing and firm!

urea - a chemical found in urine, urea can help soften the skin and collect and hold moisture in the skin. Urea is no longer collected from urine, but once upon a time, it was!

Will you also hop on the natural health products bandwagon? That is one choice you must make for yourself, but there are obvious benefits to using natural shampoo as opposed to the chemically loaded brand name shampoos. However, the market tells us that you are going to be hopping on the bandwagon very soon.

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