Ingredient lists and skin irritation tests get read carefully. The container a product comes in rarely does. We tested our donkey milk lotion for heavy metals, and we tested the tube separately. Here is what that means.
Why test for heavy metals?
"Does that mean heavy metals are put into cosmetics?" No. Heavy metals are not ingredients anyone adds. A cosmetic is made by mixing and processing many raw materials and then filling it into a container, and a test checks whether unintended trace impurities came in along the way. Put simply, it looks at quantities far too small to see, using analytical equipment, and checks them against set limits.
We did not stop at reviewing raw material documents. The test was run on the finished lotion, after every manufacturing step, because that is the state in which it reaches your skin.
Why test the container too?
It is easy to assume only the contents touch your skin. In daily use, hands are on the container every time the lotion is used. The contents and the container are made of different materials, and the items checked can differ, so we did not judge both with one test. The container was tested on its own.
What was checked
A heavy metal test for cosmetics checks, by a set method, how much of substances such as lead, arsenic, mercury, antimony and cadmium a product contains. In every item tested, the result was "not detected". In plain terms: none of the heavy metals tested for were found.
One piece of evidence, not the whole picture
A single heavy metal test cannot stand for a product's entire safety. It is one objective reference you can use when choosing a donkey milk lotion. Comfort in daily use matters just as much. SKYMILK Ceramide Lotion contains donkey milk, our core ingredient, and ceramide. It spreads smoothly with less stickiness, made for gentle everyday hydration after washing, including on dry and sensitive skin.
Apply a moderate amount in a thin layer and let it absorb, rather than a lot at once. On areas that are especially dry, a donkey milk cream can be layered on top depending on your skin.
If you came here after seeing "heavy metal tested" on a product page, we hope it is now clearer what was checked. We will keep looking at what you can feel, and at what you cannot see.