I Built My App Before AI
Twelve years ago, when I found out I was carrying twins, I set out to use only baby-safe and pregnancy-safe products. While googling products and ingredients, I had an epiphany — the products I was using weren't actually safety-tested by any governing body. Even worse, chemicals in the cosmetics I'd been using for years were linked to health risks like hormone disruption and even cancer. This led to an intensive research project on every ingredient in every product. I documented all that I learned because I knew this crucial information would help others one day.
When my twins were five years old, I started to share my research on switchnatural.com. This quickly expanded to a tight-knit community on Instagram, where my daily unread messages numbered in the hundreds.
In 2021, I realized that I needed a tool that allowed my community to access my research in real time. I wanted it to be quick, easy to use, and accurate. While there were two other apps available at the time, the EWG Healthy Living App and the Think Dirty App, they had several major issues:
1. A product had to be in their database to get a rating, and most of the clean indie products I used had no barcode, so they weren't in the database at all.
2. These apps didn't explain how they calculated their scores, and didn't link to research (they were like black boxes).
3. Most importantly, these apps often failed to flag potentially harmful ingredients. EWG's scoring system also appeared inconsistent across brands.
So I set out to build a brand-new app. One that could scan any ingredient list, with no hidden scores or brand bias. Back then, I couldn't ask AI to build my app, and software developers were super expensive. I took a slice of my retirement savings to hire an independent developer across the world to code it for me. We'd meet up via chat at 2 a.m. my time and go through the screen designs I mocked up in Canva (no templates), and she'd code it. Back and forth we went for months. It was clunky and slow, but I used our prototype to test thousands of ingredient lists to find the errors. And there were so. many. errors. Errors that only I could find because I knew what ingredients to look for.
One of the actual Canva screens I marked up and sent my developer.
We ended up with a highly customized scanner to account for the multitude of idiosyncrasies in labeling, which I picked up during my testing. We made countless iterations on the text reader, so that ingredients would be captured regardless of how a brand displays them on packaging.
All the while, my research on ingredients continued because new studies are regularly published. That part hasn't changed. After months of intense work, we squeaked out a version I felt good enough to share, and Apple approved it just in time for a New Year's Day launch.
One of the first messages I received on launch day — an incredible feeling.
When I look around at all of the apps popping up in today's AI landscape, I'm left wondering: would it have been easier for me to build my app today? Sure, it would have been cheaper and faster, but the core of my app, the thing that makes it spectacular, can't be replicated: the living, breathing ingredient database that I started building twelve years ago and continue to update to this day (with no end in sight).
There is simply nothing that can replicate the research and parsing of details that I've done and continue to do. AI pulls from what is already out there and makes a guess. When it comes to telling you what's clean, it doesn't distinguish between independent research and industry-funded research. I'd never rely on industry-funded research, which inherently has conflicts of interest. AI routinely recommends “non-toxic” products with potentially harmful ingredients. And I've asked all the characters: ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini.
It irks me to think millions are relying on unreliable results from what looks like a competitor (the Yuka App boasts around 80 million users as of this writing). But the Switch Natural App is an entirely different tool, built specifically for this community. AI can't tell you what's really clean — only a human can. While building Switch Natural has been far more work than I ever could have imagined, I'm happy to be the human who did it, so you can feel empowered to choose safe products.
— Andrea
If you ever find yourself poring over an ingredient list, confused about what's really clean, try scanning it with my app, Switch Natural. Your first week is free.
