It’s Been a Minute : NPR

BRITTANY LUSE, HOST:

Hello, hello. I’m Brittany Luse and you’re listening to IT’S BEEN A MINUTE from NPR. A show about what’s going on in culture and why it doesn’t happen by accident.

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LUSE: It’s 2025, baby, and a lot of us are getting started on our New Year’s resolutions.

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LUSE: And according to Pew, 79% of New Year’s resolutions are about one thing – health.

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LUSE: But there are so many different aspects to our health. It’s hard to separate fact, fiction and fad. We’re kicking off 2025 with a little series called New Year, New Me. We’re getting into some of the big questions and cultural confusion around our health and wellness.

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LUSE: This week, for our final installment of New Year, New Me, we’re diving into a new skincare trend that truly astounded me – beef tallow.

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LUSE: It’s basically beef fat that’s been rendered down from suet. And I’ve been seeing videos of people slathering it on their faces.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: I use one product and one product only, and that is beef tallow.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: You can’t eat your skin care. You should not be putting it on your face.

LUSE: Now, I wasn’t sure if it was just me seeing this. So I went out on the street to see what the public knows about beef tallow as skin care and whether they try it.

Have you heard of this trend of people moisturizing their faces with beef tallow?

UNIDENTIFIED GROUP: Oh, no.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: I have a few friends who use it, and they rave about it. I’ve not used it myself. I’m a vegetarian and I don’t use animal product or byproduct.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #4: If it works, I – like, the down side of it being a animal fat or whatever, I will still use it. I don’t care.

LUSE: Now, it seems like some of the people who use it love it. And I’m not going to knock that. But one of my guests today just might.

SAMANTHA HOLENDER: I think my reaction was twofold, and I was, like, OK, this makes sense. But then I was immediately, like, oh, no, please no.

LUSE: That was Marie Claire senior beauty editor, Samantha Holender. I sat down with her and beauty journalist, Jennifer Sullivan…

JENNIFER SULLIVAN: Thank you. It’s great to be here.

LUSE: …To understand why the beef tallow trend has taken off, what it says about what we value in our skin care and whether we should be using beef tallow at all. OK. So first, I want to know when did you start seeing beef tallow skin care on the rise?

HOLENDER: I mean, I’m chronically online and I saw, like a few rogue videos, but it wasn’t until the Nara Smith of it all that I think it really blew up. Do you know Nara Smith?

LUSE: I do know Nara Smith, But for those who don’t, she’s a Mormon influencer on social media who makes a lot of her own stuff, like, from scratch, like, from scratch, scratch. And she’s one of the most popular tradwives, for sure.

HOLENDER: She wasn’t the face. It was her husband, Lucky. Lucky was making his own moisturizer in the kitchen to a Nara voiceover…

LUSE: Ah, yes. Yes.

HOLENDER: …And they threw beef tallow in there.

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NARA SMITH: He combines some beef tallow and beeswax in a metal bowl in the top. Melt over some boiling water…

HOLENDER: And I feel like that was really the video that catapulted the beef tallow trend.

SULLIVAN: See, I feel like I’ve been seeing it, like, in the last two years or so since the pandemic, and there was such an interest in skin care then. And then when the homesteading movement sort of came about online. But I would also say it’s – even in other countries, I’ve seen it earlier, like, a facialist I know who’s in Australia mentioned that that’s been around for at least 10 years. But the social trend and the way that it’s popped off recently, yeah, I would say in the last year, so.

LUSE: That lines up with what I kind of have observed on social media. I will say I got into it because, like, on TikTok, I loved watching this Black American woman living in Ireland, like, in the countryside. She’s constantly making tallow cakes. I think eventually she would make them into soap. So I could just watch her make these, like, in a crock pot (laughter) in her kitchen.

SULLIVAN: It’s so soothing, right?

LUSE: It’s so soothing and she had, like, the loveliest personality, and I was just, like, oh, my God. But, yeah, I did notice kind of, like, the rise of tallow along with the rise of kind of, like, this homesteader-on-the-range type of aesthetic that has also made its way across social media. But we’ll get into more of that later. First, I want to throw out a theory that I have about why beef tallow is getting so popular.

I think, like, the rise of K-beauty, which we discussed on this show before. K-beauty, it’s like this huge beauty industry coming out of Korea. But they really set a standard for having, like, these five, 10, 12-step skin care routines, and me, myself personally, I mean, I was bought in hook, line and sinker, baby (laughter). I was doing so many things to my face.

SULLIVAN: Really?

LUSE: And I had to say, it looked good. But I do feel like it was the norm for a lot of those products that people were putting on their faces, like, sometimes twice a day, every single day, is they sometimes had a lot of, like, acids or other things that could be kind of harsh on the skin. I kind of think that, like, maybe this is kind of, like, a boomerang moment where people have reached kind of a saturation point with doing these intense multi-step skin care routines, and now kind of want something simple, quote-unquote, “natural,” and also, like, is not going to burn off part of their skin barrier.

SULLIVAN: I think there’s two reasons for that boomerang. One is skin care and beauty products have sort of gone the way of fashion, so we’re used to these boomerang trend cycles with fashion, and we’re starting to see that a little bit in beauty because it’s following the same way. The other is sort of what you mentioned with the skin barrier. When everybody was using all of these products, they were introducing a lot of foreign substances.

Foreign sounds negative, but I just mean things they hadn’t used before. So their skin barriers were reacting.

LUSE: Right.

SULLIVAN: Whether it was an acid or maybe it’s just, like, OK, you’re using three things, that’s introducing so many more ingredients that your skin hasn’t been used to, that you just might have, like, an irritation to. So people were – I remember it was, like, 2019. I wrote this whole story about how people were messing up their skin barriers with all of the ten-step beauty, and I was already starting to see some pushback towards a simpler type of routine, and we were primed to sort of chill out on that.

The pandemic threw a wrench in that whole thing ’cause then it was, like, well, we’re staring at ourselves on Zoom all day. But now that that’s settled down, I think that boomerang is really just coming in like you said. It was too complicated and we want it to be simpler, and we also want to have our skin chill out ’cause maybe it was a little irritated.

LUSE: I see you nodding, Samantha (laughter).

HOLENDER: I mean, I absolutely agree. I think there’s also, like, this element of the attention economy. And we’re bombarded with different TikTok trends that we are treating like fast fashion, and are we skin cycling today? Are we double cleansing today? Like, what is the trend of the moment? And it’s basically a rebellion of, I don’t want to hear any of it. I’m going to stick to my one one-ingredient product that’s going to do my face, body, hair, toes and the skin on my elbow and this one-and-done idea.

LUSE: It’s seductive, you know, to think that you can just go to the store and get one thing. Another thing that I’m seeing here is that there’s a real premium on beef tallow being perceived as natural. I saw a couple TikToks where one woman ate some of it and was like, if you can’t eat it, you shouldn’t put it on your skin, which – I just want to do a sidebar – that’s, like, not necessarily a doctor-recommended line of thinking. I just want to be clear about that. And there was another woman I saw on TikTok who said that she liked that there were just a couple of ingredients, basically, in a beef tallow skin product that she was using, and she could pronounce all of them, and she knew where they came from. Why is there such a premium on skin care that’s, quote-unquote, “natural” or pure? Jennifer, I’d love to hear from you.

SULLIVAN: Oh, I have so many reasons for this one. I think it’s confusing for a lot of people to look at a skin care ingredient list right now. Those are long names. They’re chemical names. But just because they’re hard to pronounce and maybe you don’t have experience with them does not mean they’re unsafe. So that’s one thing.

The other thing I think a little bit is just mistrust in general of corporations and government. I mean, we’ve seen, like, study after study that Americans are less trustful of corporations. And I think part of that reason is because, you know, we don’t feel that we always have control over our health care choices, and skin is part of health care. So it feels nice to think of something as natural.

That said, there’s also studies showing, like, certain ingredients that have historically been used in cosmetic products are not great for your skin. You know, the FDA bans, I believe, about a dozen now. In the EU, it’s about 1,200. And say what you will about these lists – and experts will say a lot because some of these ingredients aren’t even used in skin care – but that makes people scared. Like, when you hear there’s a list of 1,200 things in the EU that people aren’t allowed to use in cosmetics…

LUSE: Yeah.

SULLIVAN: …You’re like, what are they?

LUSE: Samantha, any thoughts you want to add?

HOLENDER: Yeah, I think one important callout is that, like, the word natural – or in beef tallow’s case, grass fed – or all of these buzzwords, there’s no regulation. Anyone can slap that on a label.

LUSE: Really?

HOLENDER: Tallow that you’re buying from TikTok Shop is not going through the FDA. They can write whatever they want on this label. It’s kind of like the greenwashing movement from a few years back. There’s no real definition for clean. There’s no – when we say natural, yes, it’s coming from a cow, but it’s almost the same logic of, would you put poison ivy on your face? Would you put poison oak on your face? Like, that’s natural. That’s from the ground. Does it belong on your face? Probably not. I’m certainly not doing it.

So I think that the idea of something coming from the ground is very appealing. There’s safety in knowing that I know exactly what is going on my face. But I think that there’s a lot of confusion in the ether when everyone with a microphone can be considered an expert. And just because it has 5 million views on TikTok or 700,000 likes on Instagram, that doesn’t mean that this is a trustworthy source.

LUSE: OK. So I wonder, are there legitimate reasons to be skeptical of commercial skin care products?

SULLIVAN: Historically, yes. I mean, there’s things like talc that might have asbestos contamination that we no longer use in certain ways, triclosan, certain formaldehydes and hair relaxers, for example. Over the course of, like, the last hundred years of modern cosmetics, we found a couple of things that are really bad. But generally speaking, most of the ingredients used in cosmetic products have a huge safety record. They’ve been around for a while. And it’s true our FDA here in the U.S. does not test products – I don’t know if people know this. But they don’t test products before they come to market. There’s no, like, hey, we gave this to the FDA. They said it’s safe. Now we’re selling it to you. It’s just not how our government is set up.

LUSE: I didn’t know that. OK.

SULLIVAN: It’s, no, you are free to sell a product. You have to show that it’s safe, but you don’t have to show it to the government. You just have to have that information should something happen. Drugs are different, obviously, and some acne products over the counter are considered over-the-counter drugs, so that would be different. But with cosmetic skin care, no.

LUSE: Yeah, to your point, I mean, there are some ingredients that have been in skin care or beauty products that have led to some scary headlines. I mean, you know, some dry shampoo was recently voluntarily recalled over potential cancer risk. Phthalates are in some skin care products, and those can disrupt the endocrine system. And so I can understand how, then, you know, if you’re coming across a lot of this news and also thinking about how to keep yourself healthy and safe, it could potentially feel like there’s so much harm out there in the skin care industry that, you know, I just need to go into my kitchen and render this beef tallow down.

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LUSE: Coming up, what do we know about beef tallow, and should we use it?

HOLENDER: The ingredients are there. It is going to moisturize your skin. That being said…

LUSE: Stick around.

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LUSE: I see similar mistrust in our consumer products in other areas, like in the Make America Healthy Again movement, which, if you didn’t know, RFK Jr. has beef tallow merch on his website, which I find very interesting. We also see it in the growing movement against ultra-processed foods.

HOLENDER: I think, like, there’s so much fear around what we’re putting in and on our bodies right now, and there’s constantly a recall or should we be doing this? Should we not be doing this? We’re just left with so many questions about what’s “best for us,” quote-quote.

LUSE: OK, so (laughter) let’s get into it. What are the possible benefits and possible harms of beef tallow as skin care? Like, what do we know and what do we not know?

HOLENDER: I mean, on its face, beef tallow has lipids. It has vitamins. The ingredients are there. It is going to moisturize your skin. That being said, A, it stinks. Has anyone smelled beef tallow?

SULLIVAN: The ones I’ve smelled are just, like, kind of – they’re just fatty. They don’t smell like beef or cow.

HOLENDER: Oh, my God, Jen, I’ve smelled some questionable beef tallow. I have a very heightened sense of smell. And yeah, this smell was not for me. B is it’s completely unstabilized. So it’s natural, yes, but when we go and buy skin care at the store, there are preservatives in those products that ensure their shelf stability and their shelf life. Beef tallow, 100% natural beef tallow, does not have any of that in it, so you can introduce bacteria. Let’s say you get a little water in it after you, you know, wash your face, and there’s a reason that we have science, and there’s a reason that we have labs. And to ignore all of that, to me, seems so crazy.

SULLIVAN: The possible benefits are the vitamin profile is great, the fatty acids are great. The other thing I have to point out just about this preservatives thing is when something is just fats or just oils, even if it’s commercially made, you don’t necessarily need preservatives because bacteria grow in anything with water, as Sam alluded to. That said, animals are full of bacteria, and if it’s not purified correctly and manufactured in a way that is tested for purity and maybe just made in someone’s backyard, you might already have bacteria in that product before it even comes to you. So that’s a little bit nerve-racking as well.

LUSE: What gets me about this is that it’s kind of being sold as this miracle treatment that is, in some ways, responding to a real fear that people have, you know, of lab-created chemicals that could be harmful potentially. But it seems like it’s trading on an idea that things used to be so much better when we didn’t have science, and everything was quote-unquote, “natural.” But back in the day, people put lead in their makeup. Mercury used to be a treatment for acne. These are both pretty dangerous things for people, but they’re both elements that occur naturally and come from the earth. It’s almost like the good old days that some people want to hearken back to – maybe they didn’t actually exist. And science is actually the thing that’s helped us avoid a lot of harm from our cosmetics and skin care products.

HOLENDER: Yeah. I think there’s a bit of irony in this whole discussion because it’s, like, in an effort to be safer and avoid all of these chemicals, as we’ve said, is kind of the discourse. People are going this more, quote-unquote, “natural route” with their beef tallow, but there’s a whole other host of safety issues that you’re introducing by doing that. And it’s – people are completely neglecting to see the many great alternatives on the market that are affordably priced, where you can understand every ingredient that’s on the back of the label. And they also come with the safety testing and the standardization and that kind of regulation that you would want from a product.

So, you know, you can go to the drug store, you can buy a $10 moisturizer that has been clinically tested in a lab evaluated for efficacy, has the same, like, level of concentration of ingredients in every single product that you’re getting, which is not something you’re going to get with beef tallow.

SULLIVAN: I think the reason beauty products are part of the conversation first and foremost – besides food, maybe being the other one – is ’cause they’re so intimate. Like, you’re putting lotion on your naked skin. And, like, maybe you don’t think as much about the chemicals that might be in the paint on your walls or the packaging that your new purse came in or the purse itself, for that matter, ’cause, you know, you’re just carrying it around. But there’s something about – your skin is, you know, porous. You’re in an intimate act when you put on cosmetics and skin care, and that makes you, like, especially prime to be fearful of these, quote-unquote, “toxins.”

LUSE: Samantha, Jennifer, thank you both so much. This is great.

SULLIVAN: Thank you.

HOLENDER: Thank you.

LUSE: That was Marie Claire senior beauty editor Samantha Holender and beauty journalist Jennifer Sullivan. And before we go, I want to say a big thank you. If you were one of the listeners who answered the call in the last month and supported our show by signing up for NPR+, I see you all. You make me so very happy. That support is so important to keeping our show going. So thank you. And if you’ve heard about NPR+ but aren’t supporting us yet, it’s really easy to sign up. It takes maybe 20 seconds. Just go to plus.npr.org.

This episode of IT’S BEEN A MINUTE was produced by…

LIAM MCBAIN, BYLINE: Liam McBain.

LUSE: This episode was edited by…

JASMINE ROMERO, BYLINE: Jasmine Romero.

LUSE: Our executive producer is…

VERALYN WILLIAMS, BYLINE: Veralyn Williams.

LUSE: Our VP of programming is…

YOLANDA SANGWENI, BYLINE: Yolanda Sangweni.

LUSE: All right, that’s all for this episode of IT’S BEEN A MINUTE from NPR. I’m Brittany Luse. Talk soon.

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