The Good Guide is my FAVORITE do-good aid. It’s a website and an app, which I use every time I’m shopping. It is a database of products (I can almost always find what I’m looking for) with sustainability ratings. You just type in the product’s name (like my conditioner – Yes to Carrots), and it pulls up Health, Environment, and Social rankings. In this case, it’s pretty healthy, although all of the ingredients aren’t disclosed (yikes), they have a good environmental management program, and are doing just OK on the social side. You can also see further details at the bottom of the page (to get to this screen click on the red thumbs down or green thumbs up and then click ‘see full rating details‘). AND, you can see a list of similar products with higher ratings, to help you make the best choices.

I’ve been using this app for a while and friends in grad school know the Harvard team who started it. I’m vouching for the science behind it because when I’ve researched the same product, I come up with similar conclusions. It basically does the research for you to make sustainable purchasing EASY! And that’s what it is all about, making sustainability easy and accessible for everyone!