To go truly organic these days, you might want to stop by the cosmetics aisle after picking out your fruit and vegetables. With the great care, and money, needed to earn USDA certification, a small but growing number of companies are hoping that having their products certified will yield a bountiful cash crop.

Think of it as tilling the soil and filling the register till.

"It's the strictest, hardest and most authentic one you can get," says author and designer Danny Seo, whose recently launched line of Whole Earth lotions and body washes bear the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Organic Seal like a little green badge of honor.

Organic makeup, lotions and body washes - which the industry calls personal care products - are not new. What is new is the determination of some companies to use the most prestigious emblem available: the government's ultra-strict food-grade standard.

Currently, the Food and Drug Administration regulates personal care products but not the term organic, which is solely the USDA's jurisdiction.

Demand for organic

Recent data show personal care products that used the term organic have increased sales 19 percent since 2007, to $443 million last year, according to the Organic Trade Association.

And in the four years since a lawsuit was brought by the Organic Consumers Association and Dr. Bronner's - an activist Southern California soap company that pressured the federal National Organic Program to include USDA organic certification for personal care products - only a fraction of the market has been able to meet the government's 95 percent standard (see "The legal battle over organic").

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