Teach Soap

Hiya folks! Long time no see! I've been busy getting my website up and going, so I've had little time to visit.


I am in a bit of a predicament regarding lip balm flavor oils, and I'd love to get your recommendations. From where do you prefer to source your flavor oils?

I ask this because I've been to two suppliers: Rustic Escentuals, and Nature's Flavors. RE flavor oils are entirely too "perfume-y" in flavor. As in, even with sweetener, the flavors are more like perfume on my lips than something that reminds me of a "flavor". NF flavor oils were recommended to me by a local lip balm crafter that sells her own in her store. She likes them because they're natural, organic flavors - so I tried them. At 3% usage rate, I can't even "taste" the flavor. Now I'm stuck with several bottles of flavor oils from both suppliers that I can't send back (most unopened, even). Lesson learned *there*.

Admittedly, I haven't tried BB's flavor oils. If you use them, do you love them? Are they "perfume-y" or do they work well?

Thanks so much for your feedback. Hope you all had lovely holidays!

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Warmly,
CraftyLeo
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May the forest be with you!

Flavor oils don't really "taste"...instead they "smell." When you sweeten the flavor oils, or if they are pre-sweetened, you are really tasting the sweetness, and combined with the smell, it sort of tricks your brain into thinking that it's tasting the smell. If that makes sense. It's sort of the opposite of what happens when you get sick and your nose is stopped up and you can't taste anything. Taste and smell go hand and hand.

I generally don't sweeten my lip balms. The sweetness can cause people to lick their lips more, causing their lips to dry out more, which is pretty much the opposite of what we want to happen. I've used a couple of RE's flavors, and don't have any problems with them. I like the peach, although I usually just use unflavored. When you say the flavors are perfume-like on your lips, what do you mean? The only thing that comes to mind is that maybe you are using too much flavor and it is irritating your lips?

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~Kelly~

Morning! Sorry that it took so long to reply; I changed my email address and had to have my account re-activated.

No, I know exactly how flavor oils work; I know that they're lip-safe fragrance oils. What I'm talking about is, at the max usage rate of 3% (because below that, some of the flavors can't even be detected), the RE flavor oils taste like I went into my bedroom & sprayed my Dior perfume on my mouth, and licked my lips. This is the case with or without sweetener. It doesn't irritate the lips, just tastes purely awful - their Red Delicious Apple, especially.

I'm just curious if there are better flavor oil suppliers out there than the ones I've tried - which now have me afraid to try others. LOL

Thanks for your feedback! Have a great day!

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Warmly,
CraftyLeo
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May the forest be with you!

I have a similar question and didn't see an answer to this one. I don't really understand why food flavorings could not be used in lip balm. They are safe, scented (thinking of things like peach, almond, strawberry, etc., that are used in frostings, candy making, baking, etc.). Do they create rancidity issues? I can't afford to spend time experimenting as lip balm sales are a very small portion of what I do - but I love the way some of the BB flavor oils are described. So far I've skirted the issue entirely by using coffee butter and peppermint essential oil (in VERY VERY light amount) as my primary two "flavors". Any advice/thoughts/wisdom would sure be appreciated.

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.

A lot of EOs are lip safe. Lemongrass and mint (lovely separate and together), lavender, I think folded orange oil? I'm not too clear on which citrus EOs are safe and which aren't.

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.