Our Story
A Parent’s Solution
In 1993, while working as a pediatrician, my dad accidentally invented transparent zinc oxide - turning thick, chalky mineral sunscreen completely clear.
Because he understood the ingredient better than anyone, brands including Blue Lizard, Shiseido, EltaMD, and Hawaiian Tropic came to him to formulate their sunscreens.
But the brands all wanted the same thing: a product that could be made as cheaply and efficiently as possible. When my dad proposed something more advanced - transparent zinc oxide wrapped in silicone and built into a reverse emulsion - they passed. It was too expensive, too complicated, and they did not believe consumers would notice the difference.
Good is not good enough
At the time, my mom - a very pale Irish woman with a family history of melanoma - had been diagnosed with melanoma. I was four years old and had just fallen in love with surfing.
My dad was not willing to protect us with a sunscreen designed around corporate margins. So he went back into the lab with his team of 25 PhDs and set out to make the best sunscreen scientifically possible, regardless of what it cost or how difficult it was to manufacture.
That formula became burnd.
Our purpose now
My dad used to tell me that not wearing sunscreen has an SPF of exactly zero.
It was annoying advice as a kid, but he was right. A product can work incredibly well in a lab, but if it is unpleasant to use in real life, people are not going to keep using it.
Our mission is to help people spend more time outside, doing what they love with the people they care about, while being smart about protecting their skin.
We at burnd travel... a lot. As nomads, we need products that work flawlessly under all conditions. Have you ever noticed how your favorite cleanser works like a charm at home, but the second you ...
When people ask what is the best mineral sunscreen ingredient, zinc oxide is always the answer. At Burnd, this is something we have believed for decades. In the early 1990s, burnd’s cofounder, Dr. ...
The pediatrician who invented the ingredient that made mineral sunscreen wearable worldwide speaks to parents ahead of summer: why starting sun protection early is the single highest-leverage thing...
Top dermatologists share their 12 best-kept skin secrets for women over 50 — and Burnd makes the list as a go-to broad-spectrum sunscreen for indoor and outdoor protection.
