Since when does sunscreen stain?

In an effort to protect my kids' skin on our Hawaii trip, I bought a 2-pack of Banana Boat Sport SPF 50 sunscreen at Costco. We had to buy 2 or 3 more bottles while we were there. I bought the Sport kind thinking that it wouldn't sting if it got in their eyes.

When we got home I realized that it had stained Abigail and Andy's swimsuits. If J.T.'s were stained, I couldn't tell because they were dark-colored. I used different sunscreen for myself so mine didn't get stained. One of Andy's and one of Abigail's were new ones that we bought over there so I was upset.

At Christina's suggestion, I called Banana Boat to see what the deal was. They said that they have an ingredient in some of the sunscreens that can cause orangish stains. They gave me some cleaning instructions that were supposed to help remove the stains. They asked that I try them and call back to let them know if it worked. While they lightened them, they didn't go away completely.

I called Banana Boat back to get the name of the ingredient that causes the staining. It is called Avobenzene and apparently all the sunscreen companies are starting to use it. Banana Boat does not use it in their "Baby" formulations so that is good to know. And the Avobenzene is more likely to cause staining with the spray formulas because of over-spray.

I just wanted to post this so anyone who reads this knows to watch out for this. In the future, I plan to only use the "Baby" formulas from now on....