Q: Are your soaps vegan?
A: Most of our soaps are vegan. Non-Vegan soaps are the goat milk soap supreme (cow/goat milk) and "CinnaBee" (beeswax/honey) soap. All other products are "animal free".
Q: Do you test your products on animals?
A: Absolutely not.
Q: What is the difference between a "fragrance" and an "essential oil"?
A: It seems that many people use the term "fragrance" or "scent" so frequently that it gets confusing when the terms are used more specifically when referring to soap and cosmetics. A soap could be "fragrant" (general use), yet be all natural, yet it would not have "fragrance" in it. What? Let me explain... all natural essential oils are extremely concentrated all natural fluids (oils) extracted from the plant. They are usually very "fragrant" and many can be used in soap making. When these essential oils are used, a soap can be very "fragrant" (general public use of the word) yet all natural, since natural plant fluid were used rathet than "fragrance" (specific soap maker's use of the word).
So what is "fragrance" compared to essential oil?
Fragrance oils (fragrance) and essential oils are like cousins. Fragrance oils are synthetic, similar to perfumes. Some fragrance oils have natural elements while others (most fragrances) are completely synthetic. So, when you see the term "fragrance" in reference to soap, it is speaking of a synthetic fragrance, not natural essential oils. This doesn't mean that the fragrance is unhealthy, it simply means that rather than extracting the oil from a plant, chemists created the chemical in a lab.
Note: Some fragrances, notably cheaper candle fragrances, have been criticized for being "unhealthy". Any fragrance or essential oil that is burned could be unhealthy since, usually, an oil is being burned with minimal ventilation (such as inside a house). Even essential oils can become unhealthy without ventilation and even if over-used on the skin. Excessive use of anything can cause an unhealthy reaction from your body. There is so much "misinformation" on the internet and we recommend fully researching information before drawing conclusions.
Q: Are fragrances natural? If a soap has fragrance in it, is it natural?
A: Many companies selling handmade soap are calling their soaps "natural", and even "all natural", when fragrances are used in their products. Fragrances are not natural. Essential oils, however, are natural. When you see "fragrance" on the ingredient list, that soap is not natural and should not claimed to be. This is why we try to clearly mark what soaps are "all natural" to avoid as much confusion as possible. Our fragrance soaps are still minimally processed and handmade with all vegetable based oils which have many other benefits, but they are not "all natural". See above question for more information on fragrance and essential oil.
Q: Are all essential oils extracted the same way? Are they all equally expensive?
A: The essential oil extraction process is determined by the difficulty of extraction (steam, pressed, etc.) and the price is also determined by these factors, as well as the commercial demand for the product. Many oils can be steam extracted, which is the cheapest method, but some have such a "fragile" character, that other expensive methods must be used. In either case, thousands of pounds of plants are used in making a small amount of essential oil, which can make essential oil quite expensive. However, if you take oranges, for example: the essential oil comes from the peel. Therefore, since orange peels aren't used in the making of orange juice, it would be reasonable to imagine that there is a greater abundance of orange peels than, for example, roses.
Q: Many of your soaps have coloring, is this natural color?
A: Most of our soaps contain colors from herbs and clays, not dyes. When in question, product ingredient lists show where the color came from. In some of our smaller temporary stock and special order items we also will use FDA approved synthetic dyes and ingredients will be listed as such in numeric form (example: Blue 1, Red 40). These colors are numbered according to FDA guidelines for synthetic coloring. There are currently no restrictions for naturally occuring colors from clays and herbs so only the raw ingredients are listed in the case where only natural coloring is used.
