OPPORTUNITIES FOR CHEMISTS IN THE COSMETIC INDUSTRY 69 I have heard people say that the control chemist is doomed to be a routine man all his life. Yes, he can be and remain a routine man, but then he is not a good control chemist. The wide-awake chemist in working with control can't fail to learn so much about raw mate- rials, formulation, and final products that he becomes a valued adviser of both the production manager, the cornpounder, the research staff, and last but not least, the purchasing department. In fact, other indus- tries have found it advantageous to have chemists advise the purchasing department in the matter of the best buys of the various products they need. So the good control chemist is not doomed to routine. He has his share of chances for ad- vancement. Before we leave the question of product control, don't let us forget the plant control man, the fellow who w•tches over the product in the making who checks on tank temperature, stirring ?ares, visual condition of the raw materials (they don't always look as good as the sample the purchasing agent sub- mitted to the laboratory, you know), packages and their appearance, etc., etc. Altogether too often this man is not a chemist, but if he is, what a grand "first line of defense" he is, when something goes wrong (as it does occasionally in the best of factories). His on-the-spot ob- servations can save the firm many weary moments otherwise spent in trying to trace the cause of a fail- ure, hours or maybe days after it occurred. And a chemical knowl- edge plus a little experience will often tell him the cause and suggest the remedy as well, when produc-' tion failures threaten. A first- class plant control man is a poten- tial production manager any day. So far we have dealt with chemists needed in the development of cos- metic products and in the main- tenance of quality. But there is an- other important angle, the safety of the products themselves. After all, even the best products will fail in the long run in spite of appear- ance, attractiveness of perfumo, package, and advertising if the con- sumers do not keep on buying them. And customers will not long keep buying any product if even a fairly small percentage of them are or become allergic to some ingredient in it or if the product proves a trifle irritating to the skin. Well, here's where the physiological chemist, the pharmacologist, and even the bac- teriologist comes into his own. Their work has become increas- ingly important with the appear- ance of Federal government regu- lation of cosmetics. Just to men- tion one example where the product information developed by pharma- cological testing is going to be im- portant: New synthetic surface- active agents are coming into the market almost daily. And often an addition of as little as a fraction of one per cent or so of one of these agents will not only confer desirable application properties to cosmetic products but will also increase the irritating properties of at least some

70 JOURNAL OF THE SOCIETY OF COSMETIC CHEMISTS cosmetics. Take heatless permanent waving for example. There is no doubt in my mind but that part of the trouble there can be laid at the door of surface-active agents. This in turn leads us to consider a broader aspect of this same prob- lem, and the chemist to fit that job. I am thinking of the man who can and will keep up with new materials. Offhand, you may say that any chemist will do that. Yes, and no, or maybe we should say more or less. Some of us seem to have more of a natural curiosity than others. And some of us keep up with literature in a haphazard fashion, while others go about it methodically. And last but not least, some of us after trying new materials or methods without suc- cess a few times, become pessimistic :and develop a conservative resist- .ance to all new things. That is a worse attitude than that of the fellow who indiscriminately falls for everything new. At least the latter will now and then come up with something of value. The ideal of course, is the man with scientific curiosity, tempered by good judg- ment. He is a scarce phenomenon, but oh, how valuable in research. Finally, there is a type that de- serves a mention even if it is hard to describe him. He is the expert in -"imagi.neering." Or if you don't like that word, he is the practical day dreamer. I almost hesitate to mention him because it is sometimes hard to distinguish him from the fellow who is just plain lazy. But practical day dreaming requires one thing the lazy man never acquires: background and knowledge of the past. The Good Book tells us that there is nothing new under the sun. Our industry may well remember that. And the practical day dreamer is the one who can go back over old and maybe forgotten or discarded products and judiciously pick out something that with a changed process, a variation in appearance, or an extension in applicability can be revived and turned into a "new product." I admit, frankly, that I cannot set up educational speci- fications for that type of chemist, but I know that every research director in his heart is fervently hoping to discover one of them among his crew. You may feel that I could sum up my many words by saying that the cosmetic industry can use chemists with almost any type of qualifica- tion. That is very close to the truth. And the future of ou'r indus- try depends on how well its need for chemists becomes recognized-- and filled. The simple cosmetics of 30 to 40 years ago do not satisfy milady of today any more than the haphazard production methods of yesterday will produce a good com- petitive product now. But neither are our products of today going to satisfy the consumer 30 to 40 years hence. There is going to be a de- mand for many improvements. To- day, for example, the terms emol- lient and lubricating are synony- mous when applied to creams. Actually, lubrication involves noth- ing more than creating a slippery