Algae is the umbrella term for water-loving, photosynthesizing organisms: everything from the tiniest single-celled microalgae to sprawling seaweed forests. Not all of them technically count as "plants," but don't tell them that.

To call something "biodegradable" without any caveats, you need proof the whole product breaks down and returns to nature within about a year of normal disposal. If it's headed for a landfill or incinerator (where almost nothing breaks down that fast), the claim doesn't really hold up.

Beauty Heroes founder Jeannie Jarnot coined this one in 2018 for a sustainability movement zeroed in on protecting oceans and marine life specifically: a more focused, water-first cousin of the broader "green beauty" movement.

We like to say that it is the responsible use of marine resources. No plastic, low water, no waste.

Marine biologist, Our Dear Friend and Mentor, Dr. Wallace J. Nichols coined this one in his 2014 book of the same name: the mildly meditative, calm, connected state that being near, in, on, or under water tends to trigger. It's less a hard scientific term and more a framework, pulling together neuroscience, psychology, and the plain old common sense that water calms us down. There's a real, researched reason for the pull toward oceans, lakes, and rivers, and Nichols spent five years chasing it down.

The science behind why we can justify our water obsession to our accountant..

A circular economy is designed to eliminate waste entirely: materials stay in use at their highest value for as long as possible, and nature gets to regenerate instead of just getting depleted. It's the opposite of the old take-make-waste playbook.

Listen, everything must go somewhere. Let’s design with that in mind and eliminate anything that bioaccumulates in marine life, human bodies or aquatic systems.

Here's the truth: there's no legal definition for "clean beauty." The FDA doesn't regulate it. Any brand gets to decide what "clean" means for them and put it on the label, which is exactly why it means something different every time you read it.

Compostable is biodegradable's more specific sibling: it has to break down into usable compost, in a home or municipal composting setup, in roughly the same time as other compostable materials. If most people buying it can't actually access composting, the claim needs a caveat.

No legal definition here either. The FDA doesn't require animal testing for cosmetics, but it also doesn't police who claims to be cruelty-free, so anyone can print it, proof or not. Leaping Bunny (since 1996) is the closest thing to an actual promise: certified brands commit to no new animal testing, submit to real audits, and recommit every year.

Our promise: Tested on friends and family, not animals.

A material engineered to safely apart and disperse in liquid, not just get soggy and hang around. Same idea behind detergent pods (without the chemicals or plastic-lace films) and dissolvable stitches: designed to disappear, not just decompose eventually.

Depends who you ask. Wipe manufacturers wrote one standard (GD4) that lets a product pass with 7 out of 9 tests. The people who actually run sewer systems wrote a stricter one (IWSFG) that demands near-total compliance. A wipe can legally say "flushable" under one and still clog pipes under the other.

Kelp is a specific, very large, very fast-growing type of brown seaweed that forms entire underwater forests. Every kelp is seaweed. Not every seaweed gets to be kelp.

Seaweed's overachieving cousin. Grows absurdly fast, probably has a smoothie brand by now.

The catch-all term for bioactive compounds pulled from ocean life (seaweed, algae, marine minerals) and used in skincare for things like hydration and calming inflammation. How much of that benefit survives into the bottle depends a lot on how it's processed.

Listen, the ocean has spent mil.ions of years perfecting these molecules, and only now are we beginning to understand them

A twist on "terroir" (the way a place shapes the character of a wine or crop), applied to the sea instead of soil. We liken it to the fact that water is our original mirror for humanity and that the ocean is reflective in everything that we do, and all that we are.

Terroir, but make it ocean.

Plant-based doesn't mean plastic-free. It just means one ingredient grew before it got processed. The rest of the formula could still be straight from a barrel of oil.

Tells you where it started. Says nothing about where it ends up.

Regenerative means going further than just "doing less damage." Regenerative ocean farming, for example, actively rebuilds marine ecosystems while it grows: a single 20-acre seaweed farm can pull meaningful carbon and nitrogen out of the water every year, just by existing.

Doesn't just avoid harm. Leaves the place better than it found it. Sustainability's overachiever.

The plain-language word for macroalgae: big, multicellular, photosynthetic organisms that grow in red, brown, and green varieties. Fun fact: not technically a plant, no matter how much it looks like one.

You know the feeling: a genuinely good idea shows up out of nowhere while you're doing something as mundane as showering. We borrowed the phrase and turned it into the ethos of this whole company. Our founder kept noticing her best ideas came to her in the shower (aka Flow State), and it got her wondering how to bring that same clarity into her everyday routine: less water, less plastic, less waste. That question became the company.

Shower Thoughts, those mindful moments that get channeled into meaningful innovation.

Same story as "clean": no single legal definition, no one checking anyone's homework. It's one of the most-used words on a label and one of the least defined.

We even question whether it should belong in a job title… it’s a responsibility

Also called anhydrous beauty: products made without water as an ingredient at all, which usually means a more concentrated formula and a smaller water footprint. Worth remembering: about two-thirds of the world deals with real water scarcity for at least a month every year.

This one's ours, not an industry standard. For us, it means holding every stage (how something's made, how it's used, how we talk about it) accountable to its actual impact on water.

Also ours. Broadly: desgned not to harm the water systems it eventually ends up in. We're working on pinning down the exact criteria behind this claim so it holds up to real scrutiny, not just good intentions.