POSITION PAPER 2

 Breaches of Ethics: 

Sugar Bear Hair

    Today, it is not uncommon to see people identify as “influencers” or “social media professionals” because of the huge and constantly changing digital world. Because so many individuals now claim the job title of influencer, brands who wish to expand their audience waste no time in jumping on the bandwagon of getting certain individuals to advertise their product. On Instagram, some of the most popular ads you can see would be phone cases, makeup items, hair products, and many more. While this can be a great form of promotion for brands, it is also important that they are very careful to not land themselves in hot water with their audience. 

One of the biggest and most popular brands that is seen all over social media, especially Instagram, being advertised by huge celebrities is Sugar Bear Hair. Sugar Bear Hair is a brand that sells gummy vitamins that are meant to promote hair growth, sleep, and overall health. The brand was started in 2015 in Florida by couple Nicole Nightly and Dan Morris. The vitamins are not super cheap, starting at $30 for a container of 60 gummies which is a month’s supply. From its start, Sugar Bear Hair owners have invested lots of time and money into getting big names to advertise for their brand. However, are the advertisements always straight forward, or do they tend to be misleading in some ways?

    The key to any good marketing is simple: who is doing the marketing? Sugar Bear started its advertising on YouTube but, when that was not working, they took to Instagram where the business took off. Since then, Sugar Bear Hair has pretty much mastered the key to marketing by getting big names such as the Kardashians and Jenners, Emily Ratajkwoski, Bella Thorne, Vanessa Hudgens, and multiple Bachelor franchise contestants as partners. Obviously the biggest names on this list are the Kardashians and Jenners. Both Kylie and Kim have made numerous posts advertising for/with Sugar Bear Hair vitamins. I think this proves just how business-savvy CEO Nicole Nightly really is. She took her business from nothing to getting some of the biggest names in the world to market it. 

    Since the brand has gotten more and more popular, it has caused people (including dieticians) to become skeptical over the brand. Does it actually accomplish what it says it does? Is it worth the price? Do these celebrities realistically use this brand, or is it just for show? One dietician, Pigott-Jones of the British Dietetic Association, said, “If you're deficient you may have some hair loss, or some reduced growth, but taking biotin when you're not deficient isn't going to improve your hair health”. This quote and opinion reflects the thoughts of many experts in the dietary field. Many of them argue that there is no single vitamin that can replace the benefits of healthy habits such as a well-balanced diet. 

    Another way many people backup their opinions of skepticism towards Sugar Bear Hair vitamins is simply to point towards the people who are advertising the product. These big names that are popular partners with the brands are often models, actresses, or famous influencers who have teams of makeup and hair artists with them daily. Posting Instagram pictures or stories is quite literally part of their job. That is how they make part or all of their money, so I imagine it is a long process to get them ready for a picture that most people would just scroll past in one second. All of this to say that, most of the time, the hair in these pictures is not real. A Professor Ramos blog said it best: “Many people influenced by beauty gurus and other endorsers have failed to realize that the hair they are sharing with their social media accounts is also thousands of dollars worth in coloring, care, and a lot of the time extensions.”

An article on the Good Housekeeping Home website did a deep dive into whether or not Sugar Bear Hair vitamins actually work or do what they claim to do. The full list of ingredients for the hair gummies are glucose syrup, sugar, water, pectin, citric acid, sodium citrate, natural flavors, titanium dioxide, Blue 1, coconut oil, and carnauba wax. The vitamins are also vegan and contain Vitamin A, Vitamin C, Vitamin D, Vitamin E, Vitamin B-6, Folic Acid, Vitamin B-12, Biotin, Pantothenic Acid, Iodine, Zinc, Choline, Inositol, as the active vitamins and minerals. 

    The brand says that you only need to take two of these gummies a day in order to make your hair meet your hair goals. However, once again, an expert has argued against the true benefit of these vitamins in the aspect of doing anything for your hair. Jaclyn London (MS, RD, CDN), Nutrition Director at the Good Housekeeping Institute, says, “From a clinical POV, there’s really not enough data to support taking multivitamins for better hair, skin, and nails unless you know you’re deficient in one (or all) of the nutrients found in SugarBearHair.” Beyond just opinion, there is actually no concrete evidence that what you think is in the bottle is actually in the bottle. The FDA has not approved or overseen vitamins like Sugar Bear Hair for safety or efficiency. While there is not really any skepticism that there are dangerous ingredients in the gummies, there just simply is not any evidence or proof that they are telling the truth about what is in the gummies. 

    Overall, I think Sugar Bear Hair has done a great job in marketing and making a name for themselves because of the famous partners they have. I do not even doubt that the gummies taste great and actually do have ingredients that are healthy and good for you. However, I highly doubt that they are magic hair-growing vitamins. I think it has been extremely misleading to advertise these vitamins as ones that will help your hair grow stronger and healthier in no time, and when the majority of a company’s advertising is from social media influencers then I think that is a major red flag!