About allergies and products

Our immune system keeps us healthy by fighting against anything harmful that enters our bodies – like bacteria and viruses. An allergen is something generally harmless that your immune system responds to like it’s a threat. You’ll usually get exposed to something a few times before that happens. But once you do, you’ll normally have that allergy for life.

Allergic reactions on your skin can often take a while to show – usually 24-48 hours after you came into contact with the allergen. You might hear this called ‘delayed hypersensitivity’, ‘type IV allergy’ or ‘contact allergy’. Most of the information here is about this kind of allergy, because most of our products can touch your skin in some way.

There are two stages:

First, your body responds to an allergen and becomes sensitive to it. At this point, there aren’t any obvious symptoms, but the change to your immune system is permanent.

If enough of the allergen touches your skin again, that’s when you’ll start to see the symptoms of an allergic reaction.

‘Type IV allergy’ or ‘contact allergy' reactions normally appear 24-48 hours after you come into contact with an allergen. You might see redness or a rash, swelling, blistering, weeping, crusting and itching. If you’re allergic to one ingredient, you might also be allergic to similar things. A dermatologist can tell you which other ingredients, if any, you might need to avoid.

Symptoms like redness aren’t always due to an allergy. If your skin’s irritated, it can look very similar to an allergic reaction. Often you’ll need to speak to a dermatologist for a precise diagnosis. With irritated skin, you’ll see similar redness or a rash, swelling and itching. You might also get tightness, soreness, tingling or burning. This all usually appears within a few hours of whatever has caused it. Then your skin might dry out or crack.

But there’s one big difference between skin irritations and allergic reactions – the effects of skin irritation won’t always happen again, even if you use the same product on the same bit of skin. But once you become allergic to an ingredient, a high enough amount of it will always cause your immune system to react the same way again.

A lot of ‘type IV allergy’ or ‘contact allergy' allergens appear naturally in everyday life. Plant allergens like poison ivy and metals like chromium and nickel are good examples.

If you recognise the symptoms we’ve listed and you think you could have a skin allergy, speak to your doctor or a dermatologist. It’s a good idea to make a list of all the products you used shortly before your allergic reaction. If you can, take the products and packaging with you so your doctor can see what’s in them.

A dermatologist will do some tests to figure out the cause of the reaction. They’ll examine you and ask questions about your symptoms and when they happened. They might also ask you to undertake a diagnostic patch test with the products you’ve used or specific ingredients within them.

Once you know what you’re allergic to, you can look out for it on ingredients lists and avoid it. Be wary of counterfeit products – you can’t always be certain what’s in them.

We can help you and your doctor figure out what you’re allergic to. If you require any information please contact our care line.

There are small number of fragrance ingredients that have been identified as having the potential to cause skin allergies.

The International Fragrance Association regulates the way we use these ingredients. At Unilever, we try to use fewer of them and we use them at a lower level than the industry standard. If you are in Europe, we now also offer a searchable database to help anyone with an allergy to one of the ingredients to search for products that might be suitable for them. Select your country from the list.

Preservatives are important – they ensure our products are safe to use to the end of their shelf life by preventing the growth of bacteria and mould. We only use preservatives when they’re absolutely necessary, and always in as small an amount as we can. But again, a few people can be allergic to a few of these ingredients.