Future Soapmaker On Board!

That's a pretty exciting title, right? I don't think anyone is as excited as I am to announce that Robinson baby #3 will be making his/her debut this November! Squeeee!! My two older daughters are bouncing off the walls - let's hope they're this excited when a 3 a.m. cry rings out in the house!

So, what does this mean for OHTC? Several things, it turns out. The very first thing is ensuring an absolutely safe working condition for myself and my growing little one. This means taking extra care to continue working safely - things I'm happy to say that I've already been doing for quite a while. I wear gloves, safety goggles, a mask, an apron, and my hair is always contained. Containers are carefully labeled (lye solutions in particular) and stored properly. A wash station is always available to me should I spill any caustic substances (soapers, by now I hope you know that the MSDS sheet for sodium hydroxide lists a cold water flush as the best way to handle a lye spill!).


Tea Tree Mint - one of our most popular soaps! It's also got an awesome swirl of activated charcoal, nettle leaves, bentonite clay, zinc oxide and red reef clay. 
My #1 concern, it turns out, is working with essential oils. Many of you may already be aware that I am allergic to tea tree oil. Sadly, this is one of the main oils in one of our most popular soaps: Tea Tree Mint. I only make this soap a few times a year, on days when I can really ventilate my soaping area with open windows. I also have to take a dose of Benadryl otherwise my throat will begin to close up. Believe it or not, but in my cost analysis, I actually include the cost of the medicine for this batch! The first time I ever worked with tea tree oil was in a (well diluted) coconut oil salve that left me with hives that took weeks to go away! Essential oils are quite powerful and allergies are real - which is why I now always exercise caution with a new oil. Oregano is another one that gets my husband's allergies going, so it's one I won't even keep in the house.

I'm sure you know where this is going. I can't risk a major tea tree oil reaction while pregnant. This affects not only the soap, but also the Tea Tree Mint mineral bath soak (will be replaced with another minty offering; most likely a eucalyptus mint). Fans of that minty experience can still find Mentha Viridis, our eucalyptus mint blend, in a soap.

Are there any soaps that I make for folks with a sensitivity to essential oils or with a medical condition that means essential oils are not possible? Of course! I make a very simple Oatmeal Milk and Honey soap that is free from essential oils and has a basic two oil soaping formula. This is the soap I love using on my little ones! Another soap that I often reach for is Hippie Peace. I love the soft gray color from the sea clay and the swirly lines from the cocoa powder. The essential oil blend is a simple one - lavendula angustifolia and pogostemon cablin (lavender and patchouli). Neither are contraindicated in pregnancy according to NAHA and Tisserand. Keep in mind that not all lavenders are safe in pregnancy - lavandula stoechas or French/Spanish lavender is not considered safe. This is why botanical names are so important!

Another major change is that some categories may be put on hold until next year. Our sugar scrubs are one such category, along with our bath bombs (once they're sold out, they're sold out!). Our whipped body butters have always been discontinued over the summer months to avoid melting in transit. I don't expect any of those categories to come back until 2016. Our wax items are definitely staying, along with our lip butters (one of our biggest sellers!) and many of our soaps (you'll see seasonal flavors come and go as usual) as well as our mineral bath soaks. I haven't had any trouble with making these items so far and I'm happy to continue to do so!

As I get closer to delivery and as I know more about how I'm progressing, I will be happy to update with future blog posts/social media shout outs about how maternity leave is shaping up. Right now, it looks like my tentative shut down date is going to be around November 1st. If you, like many others, rely on OHTC for your holiday shopping, this is a great year to get it out of the way early!

Thank you so much for all your continued support and awesome messages of encouragement over the course of this journey. I definitely do not plan to shut down OHTC. I definitely do plan to put family first. I'm glad that so many of you support a small business with that brand of ethics! In the meantime, let's keep having fun together!

Soap making oils!

Why are certain oils not ideal for soap making? Have you ever wondered why soapers choose the oils that they do? How do we create our formulas?

First, the best point to remember of all is this: just because an oil is good in a lotion or leave-on product, does not make it a good candidate for converting it into soap. In large enough quantities, some saponified (soaped) oils can feel like taking a shower with lotion - no lather, greasy after feel! Some can go rancid too quickly (and who wants a rancid soap??). Some are just plain too expensive for use in a wash-off product. Others have components that the lye does not react with and therefore it does not saponify (turn into soap via a lye reaction) at all. Mineral oil is one such example. Jojoba oil is a close second in that category as it does saponify, but only a small part of it does - making it unsuitable for use in soap, except in minute quantities (it is also generally too expensive for many to put into a wash-off product).

Our soaping formula in action! Testing an essential oil blend out - rough life!

Without getting too in-depth about my formula, I will say that I (along with most other soapers) am always looking for that balance of cleansing, bubbles, lather with conditioning, moisturizing, and long-lasting bars. Bars that are too conditioning, with too much oil left behind can leave you feeling like you didn't get completely clean, and it can also mean little-to-no lather. Bars with too much lather and a very low superfat (superfat = a calculated excess of soaping oils that are left over in the bar and do not turn into soap) can make for a very drying soap that strips the skin. Balance is key.

Soap hardness and durability are another factor. We are always looking to create a harder, longer-lasting soap. Handmade soap cannot sit in water for any length of time and it should be allowed to dry completely between uses. We cure our soaps for 6 weeks in order to help produce a hard bar. Shea butter and coconut oil also helps achieve the same goal. Over a long enough period of time, olive oil also produces a very hard bar. We have started to include sodium lactate as well - this is a naturally derived salt from fermented corn or sugar beets, often used in the dairy industry (yogurt!).

Without getting too technical, the fatty acids included in every oil and butter we use are analyzed for the properties it will bring to the final soap. This is why we choose some oils and butters over others. Shea butter, for example, has a high level of unsaponifiables (components that will not turn into soap) which means that as a soap making ingredient, it is highly moisturizing. It is a butter with one of the highest levels of unsaponifiables, more so than cocoa butter, mango butter, avocado and kokum. It is also saponifiable enough to create an actual bar of soap instead of an oily mess, unlike high levels of jojoba oil. You could say that it's in the "sweet spot" for soap making! It also contains a healthy dose of stearic acid as part of its fatty acid profile - which makes for a very hard soap with stable, moisturizing lather. Is shea expensive? Yes. It is by far the most expensive soaping fat that we use. And we use a good chunk of it to boot (well over 20% of our soaping formula).



A bar of soap gone rancid. This one came from another soapmaker and contained soybean oil. It lived in my bathroom drawer for less than a year before I noticed the brown/oily spots. 
What about rancidity? Is this an issue? There are many soaping oils that have a tendency to go rancid rather quickly: grapeseed oil, soybean oil, peanut oil, cottonseed oil, rapeseed (canola) oil, sunflower oil and I'm sure some others that I'm leaving out. Some of these are very cheap to soap with, which makes them popular to use. If not protected with vitamin E or rosemary oil extract, I'd expect to try to use soaps with high amounts of these ingredients quickly (within 3-6 months) before the dreaded orange/brown oily spots occur (which means the bar turns rancid). Rancidity will make soap greasy, soft, and start to smell bad. It's a shame since soap generally is supposed to get better as it ages! Some of my favorite bars are ones I've hoarded for a year or more to use.

One final word. Any soaping formula is subjective. There are many different types of soaps out there, many different formulas (we use three here at OHTC!), and everyone feels soap differently. What might be "just right" for a mechanic's greasy hands is likely far too drying for my winter skin! And while many folks enjoy shea butter in their soaps, not everyone will. There's also something to be said for additives and essential oils when it comes to what they bring to soaps. Honey, milks, colloidal oatmeal, silk, clay, and even essential oils can all alter the skin feel of the final soap. We use these to our advantage here - it's not all about the scent or the color that these ingredients can give. It is, however, a happy side benefit!

I hope that this has helped you to understand the limitations of soap making and the reasons why we soap makers love the oils and butters that we do!

For Soapmakers: How to Navigate the IFRA!

This Pumpkin Spice soap has clove, vetiver, ginger, anise and patchouli EOs with vanilla oleoresin - a TON of IFRA math involved!

So it's Fall and those spicy essential oils come a-callin' to be made into some yummy, delicious soaps. Tis the season - they deserve to be in your shower!

Not so fast! Despite what many in the essential oil industry may lead you to believe, there *is* a guideline for safe essential oil use on your skin, even in soap. There's a limit that's set forth by the IFRA (International Fragrance Association) - you can find them at www.ifraorg.org. Some suppliers do the work for you and provide their own IFRA certificates for their essential oils. Check with your essential oil supplier for this information first as it will save you a TON of time!

But what if your supplier doesn't supply this information? Well that's when you'll need to figure out your oil's limits on your own with the IFRA.

And that's when stuff gets real. How do you use this BLASTED website? I just want to know how much clove essential oil I can put into my cinnamon clove soap! Geesh! Well, gentle soaper, I am here to help you on your way. Here's the steps I generally go through to determine the UPPER LIMIT for essential oil usage in my soap. This isn't to say that you can't use less - it's just the top of the range is all. I like to both write on the labels on my essential oil bottles and keep a running list in the back of my soap journal of each of the usage rates I've already noodled out. I suggest doing the same so you're not going through this all the time!

First, a word on essential oils and the things to look for when buying them. You'll see why we need a supplier that gives you all of the following information once we dig into the usage rates with the IFRA. We will need to be using essential oil suppliers who readily provide you with the following information:

- Botanical name of the plant the EO originated from. This is a latin name - for clove bud, we're looking for "Syzygium aromaticum L." This is how we know that we are *all* talking about the same plant here.

- Gas Chromatography/Mass Spectrometry lab report (GC/MS). This report gives you a breakdown of what is in the essential oil - normally a combination of terpenes, aldehydes, esters, phenols, oxides, alcohols and ketones. It should also give you the percentages of these components within the oil - so you know WHAT and HOW MUCH of each constituent is in your essential oil.

These are bare bones. I also like to have country of origin, the part of the plant that the EO was distilled from (leaf, fruit, bark, root, etc), and the method of extraction (steam, CO2, cold pressed). All of these affect the aromatic quality of the oil and, in some cases, the makeup of the oil's profile.

So let's get down to business!

From here on out, I'm going to use Clove Bud (Indonesia) essential oil from New Directions Aromatics (NDA) as my example. There is a .pdf of the oil's GC/MS report here.

The document you'll want (NEED!) from the IFRA is this one. Keep in mind that these standards are always being reviewed and reevaluated. An oil that's OK at one usage rate today may not be next year. I check about every 6 months or so to make sure I'm still in the right range. That might be too often, and generally you'll hear some noise-making about a popular oil's rate being changed. I just happen to be a particular brand of careful (husband might say paranoid) so I check often!

OK, back to clove! According to that GC report, this clove EO has 73.6% straight Eugenol - that's the main component of this oil. There's an additional 4.7% Eugenyl Acetate on the report - for the purposes of the IFRA, you'll find that they're both the "same thing" as far as their restriction goes. So we'll say that for this clove bud essential oil, we're dealing with 78.3% Eugenol. I like to always round UP whenever I see a decimal, because as you saw above, I'm a Nervous Nelly! So we'll call it at 79% Eugenol.

Now go to your IFRA .pdf document. Type ctrl + F. There should be a search box in the upper right. Type "Eugenol" in. You'll come across an entry with a heading that says "Eugenol" - on the .pdf file, it's on page 180.

The thing to look for here is that 1) Yes, it is Restricted and 2) The box of categories with the usage rates restrictions. For the purposes of soapmaking, we want category 9 - which is for bar soap (also liquid soap and other things). In a finished product, we can only have 0.5% Eugenol total.

OK! So now it's time for some math. Let's say you're about to make a 2 lb loaf of soap. I like to work in grams, and you'll see why in a minute. Two pounds of soap translates to about 905 grams total. This is your FINISHED soap (cured) - so if you're looking at your recipe of oils and additives, then I would add up everything except your liquid to get your total. As we all know, that liquid evaporates out and would therefore make all the other ingredients that much more concentrated - including that eugenol. So just take that out of your equation. We'll pretend that the 905 grams of soap is already minus our liquid. Ready for the math? Here goes:

0.5% of 905 grams (0.005 * 905) is 4.52 grams. That's the most Eugenol you can have in your soap. See why I used grams? That's a fraction of an ounce right there, so the smaller measurement will be more accurate.

To find out how much total clove bud oil we can use, you'll need to divide by the percentage of Eugenol (79%) we found in our Clove Bud oil. So: 4.52 / 0.79 = 5.721518987341772

ROUND DOWN. Unless you have a special scale that is great at reading those fractions of a gram, of course. I don't have such fancy things, so I round down to be safe. For this soap, you can only use 5 grams of this Clove Bud oil.

Now, if you have a smaller fraction than that and you want an easy way to measure those fractions without a fancy scale, you can always create a dilution. Let's say that getting to that .7 of a gram is really important to you and your blend. Do a 10% dilution of EO into a carrier oil that is in your soaping oils (let's say olive). So you can use 5 grams of your straight clove bud oil and 7 grams of your 10% dilution in olive oil to get pretty darned close!

And that's how you get your UPPER LIMIT from the IFRA for your oils. I used the upper limit in the soap pictured above (actually a little less!) and I can still smell it. Clove is actually quite potent! And now I know that, unless I come across a particularly sensitive/allergic person, my soap is generally safe for use. Whew!

A few more things to mention:

The reason you'll want to know the PART of the plant used for gathering the essential oil is that the oil's profile can vary widely, even on the same botanical name! For example, to compare to the clove bud above, there's also clove LEAF essential oil, which has a higher Eugenol rate (about 86%). You'll find the same goes with cinnamon LEAF v. BARK. For a higher usage, go with clove bud and cinnamon leaf. Bear in mind that the main sensitizer in cinnamon leaf is ALSO Eugenol, so you'll want to watch the total content of Eugenol in your recipe if you use both of these oils.

The other IFRA categories refer to other types of products you may also be making, including (but not limited to) lip products, lotions, shaving, toothpaste, and products for babies/children. Page 12 of this .pdf has an exhaustive list of these categories and which products they contain. So you can do the same calculations as this for any product - but definitely include the water content in your lotions and such!

Some oils are harder to figure out - a lot of folks ran into trouble with Star Anise and Aniseed essential oils: both are different botanical names - different plants - but similar profiles/aromatic scent due to the Anethole content in both. But look for "Anethole" in the IFRA .pdf and it's not there, despite being on the GC/MS reports from NDA for those oils. This is where having references like Robert Tisserand's book (Essential Oil Safety) become very useful. In it, you'll find that the sensitizer in these oils is anisyl alcohol - which IS listed in the IFRA's document. Some oils require a bit more digging in order to find them - and this is where a certified aromatherapist and resources that are written by/used by aromatherapists and chemists alike can actually come in handy!

And now, a warning (you knew it was coming!): Some oils are just plain not meant for soaping (or for any other use on your body). Some of them can be rectified to remove the compound that's banned (for example: Cade essential oil is nearly ALWAYS rectified to remove the carcinogen that naturally occurs in this oil). Bitter Almond can come FFPA (Free From Prussic Acid - aka cyanide). Some EOs, unfortunately, are irredeemable. These would include wintergreen (99% methyl salicylate - or SUPER concentrated aspirin; one drop is about 3 adult dose aspirin pills), fig leaf and wormwood, among others. Please do your research on the risks of every essential oil you are interested in. Again, Tisserand's book here is a great resource.

And one final note: I am a soapmaker. I am not an aromatherapist, not a professional in the fragrance industry, and not at all a medical professional. This is info I've managed to cobble together from various forums on the web in addition to a few books. If you find anything that's not accurate, PLEASE let me know. You can either comment or email me at jen.ohtc@gmail.com. I'm happy to admit where I'm wrong and fix it so we're not perpetuating any blind leading the blind around here! While I have a lot of knowledge on essential oils, I also know enough to know I don't know everything and that's OK - it's what makes them so much fun! Always learning something new!

And to think I thought I left behind all math and chemistry years ago. Ha! :-)

2014 HSCG Soap Conference!

*Blows dust off blog*

A-ha! It's still here! The official OHTC blog is - is - ALIIIVE! :-)

It's now getting to the end of May, and we're back. I'm back! Jennifer Robinson, proprietress of OHTC and terrible blogger extraordinaire. Well, inconsistent if not terrible. But I've boomeranged my random thoughts back, baby! There's a lot to cover, but I'm going to parcel it out over a few posts since it may be a bit overwhelming in a single post. We cool with that?


Off to learn all I can learn at the HSCG 2014 conference!
First, I'm going to talk about an amazing organization for soapmakers and cosmetics manufacturers called the Handcrafted Soap and Cosmetics Guild (of which I am a proud member!). Not only do they offer a pile of great incentives for being a member, but the camaraderie and networking with other soapmakers is downright invaluable. Some of my awesomest friends are also fellow guild members! If you're a soapmaker reading this and on the fence about joining the guild, then I cannot recommend it highly enough (even if you do not attend their annual conference). Join us! www.soapguild.org

As for the annual conference, this year we all descended upon the amazing town of Tucson, AZ for a jam-packed few days of all things soap and cosmetics! If you're reading this and wondering why cosmetics, then I invite you to read a prior blog post on here (Ingredients) which explains why so often items like soap, sugar scrubs and salt soaks can be considered a "cosmetic" rather than simply just soap!

I learned quite a bit at this year's conference, and something that I truly did not expect to learn along the way: that OHTC is actually going in a great direction and making some wicked smaht moves after all! It turns out that the worst thing I'm doing is getting in my own way and being my own worst enemy! Small business, as I learn again and again, is 90% hard work and persistence, once you have your amazing product and the confidence to know that you and your stuffs is enough! I'm sure you can guess by my bolding where I needed a swift kick in the pants!

What does this mean for OHTC? I got the tough love about being more confident in my product and my knowledge base. It turns out that obsessively reading, researching, blending, experimenting, learning over a period of several years (7 years alone with essential oils and 5 years with soapmaking - holy cow!) does amount to quite a bit. I make a fabulous soap guys, and I'm not afraid to say it!

Radio silence is over, fabulous soap, amazing skin goodness and out-of-this-world scents are back in!

Thank you: HSCG fairies, speakers, friends, family, little girls, one crazy supportive husband, big bubbles and even bigger hugs. I needed it so much!

Chai Tea Soap!

I first tried chai tea (the actual beverage) when I was about 16 years old, in a now-long-gone coffeehouse on Bardstown Road in Louisville, KY (Twice Told Coffeehouse, guys - *tear*). They even offered a chai shake that was to die for. When I started selling soap, nailing a chai tea scent for soap became a huge priority. Spicy, sweet and warm - who wouldn't be thrilled with that combination?

Chai Tea Soap. A bit spicy, but very much like the real thing!

I went through several, ahem, "drafts" of this soap. I knew I wanted the color split, a sprinkle of nutmeg on top, and soap curls on one side. The color split, believe it or not, is the toughest thing to pull off! Vanilla and vanilla-based items tend to make soap turn brown. I found that I got the most authentic chai tea scent when I used (of course) real chai tea extract (which I make myself from bags of certified organic chai tea). The extract is oil-based and takes several months to make; I tend to have several mason jars of it going at any given time!

Infusing!

When I make this soap, I measure out my butters and oils with a discount in the olive oil. The entire batch is scented with a blend of mace, clove, cinnamon, and ginger essential oils (all at skin-safe levels according to IFRA guidelines for soap). I then carefully split my batch by weight and add in the discounted olive oil to each pot: regular olive oil goes into the soap batter that's intended to go white, and vanilla oleoresin and chai tea extract (in olive oil) goes into my "brown" pot. Vanilla naturally turns soap brown due to its vanillin content, which works perfectly for the design of this soap! 

So where's the math? Well, for every batch I make, I have to carefully calculate the amount of lye that I use in order to turn all of my butters and oils into soap. In fact, I actually discount my lye amount (as most soapers do) in order to have a % of free/unsaponified oils and butters in my soap, which makes it extra moisturizing! I have a regular recipe that I use for most of my soaps (the ones with the super high shea butter content) and I tend to follow that base recipe with variations on scent and color. For this particular soap, it's less straightforward as I have to account for extra oils with my extract. So it's back to the calculator!

Curls, the dregs of my last infusion, and powdered nutmeg for the top!

In the mold, mission accomplished!

The result, thankfully, is very much worth the effort! Chai Tea is a popular bar with quite the following - great for folks who can't decide which bar to start off with!

Available here: Chai Tea Soap

Jennifer

The Day I Found Soapmaking

On its surface, making soap is a really weird sort of thing to decide to start doing. I certainly wasn't putting it down on my "what I want to be when I grow up" worksheets when I was in school. I have actually changed professions quite a bit in my time (I've been a newspaper reporter, worked in human resources, lifeguarding and swim instructor through high school and college - the list goes on!). 

Audrey and her little sister Daphne, April 2013.

In 2008, my husband and I welcomed our first child into our family: Audrey! One day, after giving my new little baby a bath, I noticed that she was developing flaky, dry patches on her skin. I had had similar patches on my legs for most of my adult life. My husband, a family practice doctor, had said that there wasn't much to be done about it beyond the prescription creams I'd tried up to that point. It's funny how you'll let things like that go about yourself but when it happens to your kids, you MUST fix it immediately!

It was around this time that I dug a little deeper into the products I was using on my baby's skin that an (ahem) popular baby wash manufacturer - the very one we'd been using - disclosed that they did in fact put formaldehyde in their products. How was this possible? This came from a formaldehyde-releasing preservative (Quaternium-15) used in all of their products. 

At this point in time, my family and I lived in Indianapolis, where we had stores like Whole Foods and Trader Joe's to shop in. A new Kroger has sprung up and offered an expanded selection of their "Nature's Market" section. This was in the early days of our crunchy/granola revolution (where as a family, we prioritized certified organic foods, breastfeeding, making our own household cleaners, and the like). You know where this is heading: along the way, I stumbled across lye-based soaps. A cursory search found many folks were making soaps this way; my interest was immediately piqued.

My very first bar of soap: Lavender with Oatmeal and Honey

It took me several months of obsessive research, reading, video watching, and poring over www.millersoap.com before I made my first soap. That soap was made using olive oil, coconut oil, palm oil (which we no longer use), lye, water, colloidal oatmeal, honey (which darkened the soap), and lavender essential oil. I still have a bar of this soap! While I can't truly compare this soap to the ones I make now in quality (it's quite laughable really), at the time we LOVED and used up nearly every bar of this soap. It immediately replaced all of our soap; even my husband (who really just wants to be clean - who cares about the soap!) refused to use anything else. Audrey's little dry spots vanished, and along the way, my legs stopped having their flaky, dry patches. 

We were completely converted. This is why so often, you'll hear me say that handmade soap - ANY handmade soap - is going to be better than 99% of anything else you can buy. It took me many more years before I started to sell my soap, time that I am grateful that I spent because it allowed me to tweak and perfect my final recipes before selling, as well as the experience I gained in what happens when a soap batch goes wrong, what my soap looks like one (or five!) years out, how my scents age, and to see what my colorants will do (which is especially important when using plant-based colorants; not all of them perform equally!).

Logo!

But what's with the name, you ask? I didn't want to insert my kids, who are my ultimate inspirations, into my business model. Orchard Hill is my happy place. It's a grove of trees in bloom, bees buzzing, wind swishing through the leaves, a hammock strung between branches, and complete serenity. I actually think about it when I meditate and when I'm calming down at the end of the day, ready to go to sleep. It's the feeling I want someone to experience whenever they use something I make. I think of it before everything I make!

Soapy soaps!

Freshly-cut bars of Mentha Veridis (Eucalyptus + Mint with Rosemary), waiting to cure!

Since we have some new fans, I thought I'd go a little into what a standard OHTC bar of soap is like. The only exception to all the attributes I'm about to mention is our Oatmeal, Milk and Honey bar, which we try to keep as simple as possible for folks who just want soap with few ingredients to lessen the possibility of irritation.

First of all, when it comes to soap, you can rarely go wrong with choosing a soap made the old-fashioned way (with lye and oils) over what we call a "syndet" (synthetic detergent) based bar. There are a myriad of reasons, from better conditioning properties, fewer harsh chemicals, fewer toxins, and you have the manufacturer - me! - to talk to about any particularities when it comes to soap. So anytime I hear someone loves to use handcrafted soap, regardless of whether it comes from me or not, I know that they're already a convert to just how amazing and different handcrafted soap is!

Source: The Facebook page for Wax and Soapy Water

It's amazing how much the handcrafted soap movement has grown since I first started making soap. And just like the people making it, each soap is different and each soap formula is unique. At OHTC, our soaps all contain certified organic coconut milk for scrumptiously decadent lather, over 20% fresh shea butter (so your skin doesn't immediately get that awful tight feeling when you step out of the shower; oh I hate that!), pure cosmetic grade clays that are mined from the earth (and fully tested for impurities), and scented with essential oils, oleoresins, extracts, teas, botanicals, and herbs and spices you'd find in the grocery store. We only use food grade oils and butters in our soaps, and we have chosen to only use fats that have a long shelf life (like extra virgin olive oil and coconut) so you won't find your bar of soap going rancid before its time. These aren't Crisco oil bars. We are also palm oil free and choose not to use rendered fats from animals (this isn't to say that these don't make great bars of soap, because they certainly can! Our formula just went another way.). Each bar is individualized not only in scent, but also with its own blend of botanicals, clays, and design. 

OHTC's Tea Tree Mint. How many colors can you find?
They're all from clays, zinc oxide, cocoa powder, nettle leaves, and activated charcoal!

So how can you compare handcrafted soaps to each other? You can always read labels, if they're made available (soap doesn't strictly have to list ingredients, and many soapers use this as an opportunity to use terms like "natural fats" or "vegetable oil" to describe their soapmaking oils). But in reality, it's an impossible mission. We all have different skin needs and different opinions about skin care. Thank goodness there's a growing number of soapmakers to take care of all of us!