A recent report by Bloomberg alleged there was no evidence of aloe vera found in aloe vera gel sold at Walmart, Target, and CVS. They had a lab test the products and found that they didn’t contain aloe but instead had a cheaper substitute called maltodextrin, which is used to imitate aloe.
Sellers are essentially on an honor system since the FDA doesn’t approve cosmetics or give fines for selling fake aloe. So how do you know if the aloe you’re buying is real?
Here are three ways to know if your aloe vera gel is real:
1. Price
Aloe vera is harvested by hand and it’s not a cheap process. Cheap aloe products are cheap for a reason. They might contain maltodextrin, the cheaper aloe substitute, or they might only contain a very small amount of aloe vera.
2. Transparency
The company that manufactured the aloe products for Target and Walmart, Fruit of the Earth, denied the allegations and stood by their product. However, they wouldn’t say how much aloe was in the product, saying it was proprietary.
Companies who sell quality aloe products should be comfortable disclosing the exact percentage of aloe in their products. If a company won’t disclose this information, it probably means their product contains a very small amount of aloe.
3. Independent Certification
The best way to know if an aloe vera product is authentic is if it's certified by an independent organization. For example, look for a product with certified organic aloe or certification from the International Aloe Science Council.
Our aloe vera gel contains 99.75% certified organic aloe that is grown and hand picked in Texas. It’s cold pressed leaving the polysaccharides 100% intact. It’s not made from concentrate, and contains no sugar fillers or starches.
Check out our Aloe Vera Gel here.
