Green People Natural Beauty Products

Green People is one of the oldest brands in my portfolio of favourite products. I used Green People on both my babies from birth and they’re now adults. I was already very keen to use “chemical-free” baby products before they were even born. Then I realised my firstborn had eczema which made the emphasis on clean products even stronger. Green People was there for me right from the start.

The company was founded by Charlotte Vøhtz in 1997 after she struggled to find products suitable for her young daughter’s eczema-prone skin. Rather than accepting the conventional formulations available at the time, she began looking more closely at ingredients and eventually developed her own organic skincare. Nearly thirty years later, Green People has grown into a substantial British natural and organic personal-care company covering babies, children, adults, sensitive skin, haircare, dental care and sun protection.

This history is important because Green People wasn’t created recently to capitalise on the clean-beauty market. The company was incorporated in 1996 and has been developing organic products since the 90s, when organic skincare was still extremely niche in Britain. Companies House confirms that The Green People Company Limited remains an active private British company based in West Sussex.

The philosophy is much closer to what I look for than conventional cosmetics. Green People deliberately avoids ingredients including parabens, phthalates, artificial perfumes, SLS and ethyl alcohol and uses substantial proportions of certified-organic agricultural ingredients in many products. It also publishes full INCI ingredient lists and, importantly, the actual percentage of organic ingredients on individual products. That allows me to distinguish between a product that merely contains an organic botanical extract and one in which the majority of eligible agricultural ingredients really are organic.

For Simply Organic Baby, the most relevant parts are the Organic Babies and Organic Children ranges, together with the company’s extensive scent-free products. I particularly value the latter because I don’t believe that replacing synthetic perfume with large quantities of essential oils necessarily solves the problem for a baby with highly reactive skin. Green People recognises this too and offers formulations containing neither perfume nor essential oils.

Green People isn’t a minimalist one-ingredient skincare company. These are properly formulated cosmetics containing emulsifiers, surfactants, preservatives and, in sunscreens, sophisticated UV filters. This brand for me isn’t some impossible promise of being “chemical free”. It’s the attempt to formulate functional products using carefully selected ingredients, significant organic content and meaningful independent standards while excluding many substances I would prefer not to use unnecessarily.

Green People’s baby range includes washes, shampoos, moisturisers, balms and other everyday skincare. A good example of the company’s philosophy is its Organic Babies Scent Free Baby Wash & Shampoo, which is fragrance-free, dermatologically tested and made for babies and sensitive skin. Its formulation uses coconut-derived cleansing agents alongside glycerine, aloe vera, chamomile and yucca, with potassium sorbate and sodium benzoate for preservation. Green People states that 85.1% of the agricultural ingredients are organic.

The Mum & Baby Rescue Balm takes an even simpler approach. It is an anhydrous balm based around organic sunflower oil, palm oil, beeswax, sweet almond oil, shea butter, hemp seed oil and calendula. Green People states that 91.9% of its ingredients are organic. Because it contains no water, its formulation is naturally quite different from a wash or lotion requiring a more substantial preservation system.

For older children, Green People produces shampoos, body washes, moisturisers, toothpastes and an unusually substantial range of children’s sun protection. There are fragranced and scent-free alternatives, which means I can choose according to the individual child’s skin rather than having to accept essential oils simply because the overall brand is natural.

The children’s dental range is really interesting. Green People offers different toothpaste formulations, including fluoride and fluoride-free choices. Its Mandarin & Aloe Vera Fluoride Toothpaste contains sodium fluoride alongside aloe vera, betaine, stevia, olive leaf and essential oils, with Green People stating that 84.7% of its agricultural ingredients are certified organic.

Sun protection is another major part of the children’s range. The Organic Children Scent Free SPF30 is fragrance-free and uses a combination of non-nano zinc oxide and modern organic UV filters. The newer SPF50+ similarly uses several modern UV filters while avoiding oxybenzone, octinoxate, octocrylene and avobenzone.

That breadth is one of Green People’s strengths. It means choosing organic and more carefully formulated products doesn’t have to stop at baby oil or nappy balm. Families can use the same philosophy across bathing, moisturising, haircare, toothpaste and sun protection.

There is a great deal I like about Green People, starting with how seriously it takes organic formulation.

The word organic has become extremely easy to put on beauty products. A formula can contain a small amount of organic aloe vera or lavender and still create an overall impression of being an organic product. Green People gives much more information than that. Individual ingredient lists identify which ingredients are organic and many product pages state the organic percentage explicitly. The Scent Free Baby Wash & Shampoo, for example, states 85.1% organic agricultural ingredients, while the Mum & Baby Rescue Balm states 91.9%.

I also appreciate the willingness to create genuinely scent-free formulations. Green People uses essential oils in many products and clearly believes in their benefits, but it doesn’t pretend that natural fragrance is appropriate for everyone. Its scent-free products contain neither perfume nor essential oils, giving parents a meaningful alternative for babies and children with particularly sensitive skin.

Ingredient transparency is excellent. Green People doesn’t hide behind attractive descriptions of aloe vera and chamomile while concealing the functional ingredients further down the label. Full formulations are published and the company explains that names such as limonene, linalool, geraniol and citral can appear because they occur naturally within essential oils. It specifically directs people with diagnosed allergies to those compounds towards the Scent Free range.

The ingredient exclusions are meaningful too. Across the relevant ranges, Green People avoids parabens, phthalates, SLS, artificial perfume and drying ethyl alcohol. The children’s SPF50+ is also formulated without oxybenzone, octinoxate, octocrylene or avobenzone.

I especially like that the sunscreen formulations demonstrate a more sophisticated philosophy than simply declaring all synthetic ingredients undesirable. Protecting children’s skin from ultraviolet radiation is extremely important. Green People’s current SPF50+ uses modern organic UV filters including Diethylamino Hydroxybenzoyl Hexyl Benzoate, Diethylhexyl Butamido Triazone and Ethylhexyl Triazone. Those names sound far less reassuring than aloe vera, but that isn’t a reason for me to reject them. They are there to perform the critical job of protecting skin from UVA and UVB radiation.

That is exactly the sort of distinction I look for in my directory; I want fewer unnecessary exposures, not a fear of chemistry.

The children’s SPF30 also has an enormous body of product-level customer feedback, with more than 1,000 reviews displayed on Green People’s current product page and more than 900 described as five-star reviews. Product reviews hosted by the manufacturer aren’t as independent as reviews gathered elsewhere, but the volume is still useful evidence of long-term consumer experience.

Green People also makes a real effort with packaging. Its newer SPF50+ tube, for example, contains 65% post-consumer recycled plastic and is designed to be recyclable through ordinary household recycling, while its cardboard packaging is FSC approved.

I like that this remains a longstanding British business rather than a natural brand that built consumer trust independently and was subsequently quietly absorbed into one of the multinational cosmetics groups whose formulations and business practices it originally offered an alternative to.

Green People is an Approved Brand for me, but that doesn’t mean I automatically approve every ingredient or every claim.

My first qualification concerns essential oils and fragrance. Many Organic Babies and Organic Children products contain lavender, mandarin and other essential oils. These are preferable to synthetic perfume from my own perspective, but natural fragrance molecules such as limonene, linalool and geraniol are recognised fragrance allergens. Green People itself acknowledges this and recommends its Scent Free range for people with relevant allergies.

For a newborn or a child with very reactive skin, I would personally start with the scent-free products. A baby doesn’t need to smell of lavender or mandarin to be clean.

Some of the cleansing products also contain sodium coco-sulfate and cocamidopropyl betaine. For example, both appear in the Scent Free Baby Wash & Shampoo. These are functional surfactants rather than ingredients I automatically regard as problematic, but the coconut origin shouldn’t distract us from the fact that they are active cleansing agents and can be irritating to some very sensitive skins. “Derived from coconut” isn’t the same thing as rubbing coconut oil onto the skin.

The children’s Berry Smoothie Shampoo & Body Wash illustrates another reason I assess products individually. It contains sodium coco-sulfate, cocamidopropyl betaine, decyl glucoside, preservatives and aroma alongside aloe, chamomile, yucca and quinoa. Green People reports 81.04% organic agricultural ingredients, which is impressive, but this is still a formulated cleansing product rather than a bottle containing nothing except organic plants.

Palm oil also appears in some formulations. The Mum & Baby Rescue Balm, for example, contains organic fairly traded palm oil. I appreciate the attention to sourcing, but palm cultivation has such significant ecological implications that I still prefer brands to reduce dependence on it wherever practical.

I also wouldn’t repeat every health claim on Green People’s educational material without qualification. The company’s discussion of ingredients to avoid includes claims around synthetic colours, heavy metals and carcinogenicity. I am completely comfortable with a precautionary approach to unnecessary cosmetic ingredients, particularly where colour exists only to make a product visually attractive. I don’t need definitive evidence that every questionable exposure will harm me before deciding I can live perfectly well without it. But I still want to distinguish between substances classified as carcinogenic, evidence suggesting potential carcinogenic mechanisms, contamination concerns and broader precautionary arguments. That distinction makes the case stronger, not weaker.

The biggest concern I found outside Green People’s own website is customer service but this is a 21st century disease with all businesses in the world of chatbots and AI these days. I simply do not understand why the first step in cost-cutting and automation is the customer-facing front window of companies.

At the time of this review, Green People’s UK Trustpilot profile has a relatively modest 3.1/5 rating from 164 reviews. Recent reviews include customers who like the products themselves but complain about promotional discounts, customer-service responses and occasional product-quality issues. One July 2026 reviewer specifically described the products as good while calling the customer service extremely poor, while another reported unusual white fragments in a sunscreen.

The review sample is far smaller than the thousands of individual product reviews Green People has accumulated on its own site, so I wouldn’t conclude from Trustpilot alone that the products themselves have a widespread quality problem. But it is exactly the kind of information I want this directory to capture. A brand can make products I genuinely like and still have aspects of its operation that need improvement.

Independent organic accreditation is one of Green People’s strongest features.

Green People describes itself as a pioneer of certified-organic beauty and maintains a dedicated certification programme across relevant products rather than simply using organic ingredients without external standards.

Individual products clearly identify their certification status and organic content. The Organic Babies Scent Free Baby Wash & Shampoo, for example, is sold as Certified Organic, while Green People states that 85.1% of its agricultural ingredients are organic.

Green People’s relevant product pages also identify products as cruelty-free, and many products are vegan. The important distinction is that the entire range shouldn’t automatically be described as vegan because some formulations contain animal-derived ingredients. The Mum & Baby Rescue Balm, for example, contains beeswax.

Many products also carry additional independently assessed characteristics appropriate to their purpose. The current Organic Children Scent Free SPF50+, for example, is allergy certified, dermatologically tested, vegan and cruelty-free.

I prefer recording certification at product level where necessary rather than creating the misleading impression that every certification applies identically to every item carrying the Green People name.

Green People is very comfortably an Approved Brand for me, but what I particularly like about it is that nearly thirty years of growth haven’t turned the company into a superficial version of what it originally set out to be.

The organic credentials have substance. Individual products disclose their ingredients, identify organic components and frequently provide actual organic percentages. There are fragrance-free alternatives for sensitive babies and children. Artificial perfume, parabens, phthalates and SLS are excluded, and the company is prepared to formulate differently according to what a product actually needs to accomplish rather than pursuing an unrealistic idea that everything with a scientific name must be bad.

I particularly appreciate that when I examine the products closely, I don’t find an artificially perfect picture. There are compromises. Some products contain essential oils and their naturally occurring fragrance allergens. Some cleansers contain surfactants that won’t suit every extremely sensitive skin. Some formulations contain palm oil. Sunscreens contain modern UV filters because effective sun protection requires ingredients capable of doing a very specific and important job.

The independent research also gives me a more nuanced picture than the company’s own website. Companies House confirms a longstanding active British business. The individual children’s products have accumulated substantial customer feedback, including more than a thousand reviews for the popular SPF30. But the company’s independent Trustpilot profile is much less impressive, currently sitting at 3.1/5 with recent complaints particularly around customer service.

I don’t think an Approved Brand needs a spotless record. I want it to be transparent enough that I can see the imperfections and still conclude that its products represent a meaningfully better choice.

Green People does that for me. Its combination of high organic content, meaningful certification, ingredient transparency, excellent scent-free options, thoughtful children’s products and decades of experience makes it one of the stronger personal-care brands in this directory.

I would still choose at product level rather than buying everything simply because Green People makes it. For babies and particularly sensitive children, I favour the simplest scent-free formulations first. But as a company that has spent almost three decades challenging the conventional approach to skincare and giving families genuinely different choices, Green People has earned its place here.