REFLECTIONS ON LABOR DAY

I graduated from a top liberal arts college (shout out Wheaton College. The one in Illinois, not Massachussets, lol) but you wouldn’t know it from my career trajectory.

Aside from a brief stint as a journalist, and a longer stint as a beauty blogger in my 20s, all my jobs have been heavy on physical labor.

I’ve cleaned houses, nannied, done construction and, ultimately, launched BGLH Marketplace. When I started out with BGLHM I knew a little about beauty formulation and manufacturing from my time as a beauty blogger. I realized that the big difference between chemical-laden beauty products and the natural alternative was the willingness to do labor.

The willingness to machine mix and hand churn products instead of using synthetic chemical binders. The willingness to work with thick, heavy raw materials instead of thinning them down with water. The willingness to wrap products in cold packs during the hot, summer months instead of adding synthetic anti-melt materials.

Basically the purity of our ingredients and formulation boils down to a willingness to work.

And so this Labor Day I’m celebrating all who work towards a better outcome. In a high tech culture that values intellectual labor above all, let’s not forget the importance of other forms of labor — domestic, physical and emotional — that contribute to our security and comfort.

~Leila