Earth Day the Beauty Way

I love a lot of things, but my absolute favorite thing is the feeling I get after I send a product to the "great beyond" while at the same time avoiding sending it to the landfill. Therefore, I have a drawer dedicated to recycling where I collect all of my specialty recycle items... aka items that require specialty recycling or items that you can trade in at a certain point to be recycled and *BONUS* get a freebie product! Now, I'd be jazzed to return my empty products to their home store just to be recycled, but who can resist getting something back in exchange for your empties? Here are my top favorite recycle-with-a-bonus offers:

1) MAC Cosmetics' Back To MAC: Collect 6 empty MAC plastic containers (ex. eyeshadows, lip stick tubes, etc.--cardboard boxes, pencils, etc. don't count) and take them to any MAC store to get a free lipstick (I hear Pro stores have the option of getting an eyeshadow or a lipglass instead of lipstick)! No store near you? Visit their website to complete your exchange online. It's super easy to do your Back To MAC exchange at the store--I took in 12 containers, filled out a super brief form, picked out my 2 lipsticks (Cherish and Myth) and was on my way.

2) Kiehl's Recycle & Be Rewarded: Basically, with this program you get a stamp for every full-sized item you return. 3 stamps = free lip balm, 5 stamps = free travel collection product, 10 stamps = free full sized product (up to $65). Bring in 10 items and get all 3 products! They don't count deluxe samples for stamps, but they'll still recycle them for you.

3) Zoya's Earth Day Special: While the previous two offers are good year round, this one has a brief window for participation. If you want to switch over to healthier polishes, exchange your non-Zoya polishes for a discount on new Zoya polishes. They'll properly dispose of your old polishes (did you know that you can't just trash 'em?) when you send them on over to Zoya HQ.

4) Sephora's Origins Earth Day Trade-In Event: Bring in any empty cosmetic product container to a Sephora on April 22, and get receive one of two Origins full-sized moisturizers. See the picture below for details as well as a Sephora online freebie: