Keeping your skin glowing and hair lustrous can cost thousands of dollars, and for many of us, finding the right product we have to pass through a period of trial and error. Every year hundreds of products claim to be the newest, the best and most effective treatments for everything from acne to wrinkles and all in between. We constantly look for the magic lotion or potion that would turn our skin from bumpy and wrinkled to clear and taut overnight and give us that flawless look we see on covers and pages of glossy magazines.

And since the cosmetics manufacturers are not likely to start cleaning up their act anytime soon, your best bet to protect your health is to seek out pure and safe skin care products.

When choosing skincare products to take care of your skin, you should always look at the product box or bottle. According to the new Canadian legislation, product labels must list all the ingredients regardless of their quantity. Often cosmetic manufacturers will separately list the concentration of the active ingredient, such as “2% lactic acid”. If you are savvy enough, you would easily spot ingredients you should keep away from, as they may irritate your skin or cause other unwanted reactions.

A good clean skincare product will be free from petrochemicals, sulfates, synthetic fragrance additives, PEGs, propylene glycol, triethanolamine, diethanolamine, and parabens. However, sometimes even if you stumble upon a relatively safe and properly formulated product, there’s always something that can go wrong, and the search continues. Still, there are certain ways to minimize the money and time waste.

Always request a sample. Of course, most pharmacies don’t carry sample sizes of $10 cleansers. To avoid disappointment, check the ingredients for possible irritants such as lemon oil, orange oil, grapefruit oil, or menthol, as well as harmful chemicals listed above. If you consider buying a skincare item from a department store, don’t be shy to request a sample. Many private pharmacies will decant a small amount of a cleanser or a moisturizer in a clear jar.

Always return the product that gives you irritation. This way, you will un-clutter your beauty routine as well as indicate the cosmetic company (in a very remote way) that there’s something wrong with their product. If drugstore refuses to refund, ask for the address of the company’s headquarters or a local rep and return the product with an explanation.

Accept a store exchange if refund isn’t working or you don’t want to bother with returns. Take an organic substitute of a bothersome product if the store has it in stock, or take any sensitive skin product that you can use to calm down the irritation.

Read unbiased reviews on skincare boards and forums such as MakeupAlley.com. In most cases, the product that caused 75% of reviewers to break out will break you out, too. Same refers to redness, stinging or flakiness.

Read the label carefully. Watch out for commonly used skin irritating ingredients that do little to minimise your wrinkles yet can break havoc on your skin. You can find a list of harmful ingredients in alphabetical order in the appendix of this book. Print it and carry with you when you go shopping. You may also use the handy Shopping List feature at ewg.org—simply enter the features you expect from the product.

Opt for natural preservatives in your skincare. There are many gentle preservatives used in organic skincare products that prolong shelve life but do not disrupt your health: grapefruit seed extract, potassium sorbate, sorbic acid, tocopherol (vitamin E), retinyl (vitamin A) and ascorbic acid (vitamin C).

The best way to shop for skincare products is to become ingredient-wise. You have to stop being afraid of fine print and learn to read product labels to determine good and bad product ingredients, so that you can select skincare products that are most beneficial for you.

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Julie Gabriel, author of Clear Skin: Organic Action Plan for Acne, available at Amazon.com and Barnes and Noble.