I've heard this question almost my entire life, and I still did not know the answer until this morning. Not that I spend a lot of time pondering this, but it comes up at least once every winter. Yesterday, I overheard two women talking about the lip balm in line at Whole Foods, and one woman swore that Carmex makes her lips drier.

Finally, I broke down and checked snopes.com, a great place to confirm or debunk rumors, myths and urban legends. Sure enough, snopes.com has information about Carmex's alleged addictive quality, and says the accusation is false. It states there is not an irritant in Carmex that requires you to use it repeatedly, and you cannot get hooked on the stuff, which is another common Carmex myth.

Although I'm a Burt's Bees lip balm user myself, this information pleases me, because I'm proud of Carmex, made at the Carma Laboratories in Franklin since 1937. It would be a bummer if one of our homegrown products were a scam.