Issue date: 9/27/07 Section: Features

Media Credit: Associated Press Photo Green Babies uses 100 percent certified organic cotton to create its line of adorable clothes, including this "onesie," $32 at Whole Foods.

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) - Thirty years ago, a shopper could drive all over town on 65-cents-a-gallon gasoline looking for stores that sold environmentally "greener" products.

Today, those products are far more commonplace.

If they aren't on the shelves of stores where we already shop, they are nearby.

Yet shopping "greener" is still a confusing venture.

Every time a label says "natural" or "organic" we have to stop, read the ingredient list and try to decide if the claims are marketing hype or honest attempts to let consumers know about safer products.

All that is natural and organic is not necessarily better. Then there is price.

Greener products have the reputation of being more expensive than their alternatives. More labor-intensive production costs make sense sometimes, but just as often it feels as if the steeper prices are the result of more labor-intensive advertising costs.

So with a skeptical eye, we went shopping, and what we found is good. The choices are plentiful. The stores aren't out of the way. Plenty of products have easy-to-understand labels.

While the prices are often higher, we were able to score some deals. (Check out the prices on men's organic-cotton Levis and on the ballpoint pens made out of recycled car headlights.)

BREATHE EASY

Nail polish manufacturers have been removing unhealthy-to-breathe formaldehyde, toluene and dibutyl phthalates (DBPs) from their polishes, but not all companies do, and not all companies remove all three. Reading the fine print on a bottle of nail polish isn't easy.

The print is very small.

One to try is the Zoya brand that eliminates all three of the toxins. $6, Whole Foods.

PERSONAL CARE

Cutting edge.

Handles on these colorful Recycline razors are 100 percent plastic, most of it coming from recycled Stonyfield Farm yogurt cups. $7.30 for a pack of four at various markets. (Reuse the razors with refill blades by Recycline. $5.25 for a pack of five.)

CLEAN LIVING

Buy Texas-made products such as Anne's Naturally! soaps and you'll lessen the amount of fuel used to bring products to market. Bar soap also saves packaging waste. Anne's Naturally! is found at Calloway's nurseries for $6 a bar.

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