When it comes to drugstore beauty, we would all love to find animal friendly items at affordable prices. However, the drugstore is one of the trickiest places to find animal friendly items! One of my goals with Logical Harmony is to provide you with up-to-date and honest information about whether or not brands are animal friendly. This means completely cruelty free (as in no testing at any point during production as well as no testing on the ingredients) and/or vegan (not only cruelty free, but also not containing animal ingredients). I have learned the hard way that a lot of word-of-mouth information about brands isn’t necessarily the truth. So I verify each brand myself to make sure that readers of Logical Harmony are getting the truth.

As stated in the post How To Find Out if Products Are Animal Friendly, I consider a confusing response from a company to mean that they may not be telling the whole truth about their stance on animal testing. One company that I’ve gotten an unclear response from is NYC (New York Color) Cosmetics. I’ve seen products from this company on several cruelty free and vegan beauty blogs. But, as said before, I’ve learned the hard way that not all of these blogs verify that the brands they are promoting are actually animal friendly. Wanting to be sure that I got the truth from NYC itself, I searched their website for answers and tried to get in touch with their brand reps as well.

On the company website FAQ, NYC makes the following statement :

Are NYC New York Color products tested on animals?
No, we do not test our finished products or ingredients on animals, nor do we commission any third-party to do so.

Coty Inc. Statement on Animal Testing

Coty Inc. is a leader in the global beauty industry and one of the world’s largest fragrance companies. We have developed a portfolio of notable brands and offer innovative products of outstanding quality for which we are committed to maintaining the highest possible standards of consumer safety.

However, I never go by just the FAQ page. Sometimes the information can be old. Sometimes it just might not be the whole truth. I always get in touch with the company to verify the information. Plus, a person is more likely to give you a real response to questions you might have than a FAQ page. Here is the e-mail reply that I received.

Thank you for your recent inquiry on New York Color Cosmetics regarding the use of animals in product safety testing.

Coty Inc. is a leader in the global beauty industry and one of the world’s largest fragrance companies. We have developed a portfolio of notable brands and offer innovative products of outstanding quality for which we are committed to maintaining the highest possible standards of consumer safety.

Coty voluntarily ceased testing finished cosmetic products on animals in 1991, long before the official European ban on such testing in 2004. Coty has been actively involved for many years in the research and development of alternatives to animal testing.

Before we place a product on the market, we assess it thoroughly to ensure that it is safe for human use and for the environment and that it is compliant with all applicable laws, rules and regulations. We do not perform, nor do we ever commission any third parties on our behalf to perform, animal testing on our products or ingredients. Our safety assessment of cosmetic ingredients is based on the use of recognized alternatives to animal testing, the use of existing safety data and, increasingly, the sharing of such data from and with other industries.

We continue to strive for the development and acceptance of additional reliable non-animal testing methods and will continue to vigorously support the research, implementation and improvement of alternatives to animal testing, especially for those more complex tests for which no alternative methods have been established. For this purpose we actively participate in research programs in Europe and the USA by dedicating funding, time, resources and scientific expertise. The common goal of all these efforts is to completely eliminate animal testing.

Thank you for taking the time to write to us.

What’s missing from this reply? A confirmation that NYC doesn’t test on animals at any point during the process or use ingredients that have been tested by a third-party. While the FAQ page addresses the finished product and ingredients, it’s a question that’s being carefully avoided in this e-mail response. It should also be noted that the FAQ page does not address testing during the production of their products. There is only a confirmation that the finished products are not tested on animals. Not only did I ask about animal testing, but I also asked about their source of possible animal ingredients (such as glycerin) and if they make any items that happen to be vegan. These questions were completely ignored.

When I wrote back to ask for clarification, I never received a reply.

What should you take away from this? Ultimately, it’s your call about whether or not to trust that NYC (New York Color) is a cruelty free company. I personally will not be adding them to the list of cruelty free brands on this website and I will not buy their products. They are also a brand that I will not be featuring here on Logical Harmony.