Teach Soap

Preservatives are a personal choice and depending on which ingredients you use. There are no natural preservatives available to us homecrafters that are truly natural and fully effective. If you are looking for paraben free options, I would suggest Suttocide (does have a high PH), Cosmocil CQ or Geogard Ultra. I would strongly suggest that you have your lotion oc cream tested before you sell it. You can get testing done reasonable at The Sage Script Institute. http://www.sagescript.com/microbiologyservices.htm

I almost forgot; weigh everything and get your self a quality scale; one in ozs. and lbs. and one that weighs tiny amounts like 0.000 gm. since preservatives are used in very small amounts.

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

I just checked out that link soapbuddy. Those prices are very reasonable. I am lucky to have family that works in labs and so far have never charged me. They do get some free product from time to time.

Bruce

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www.homebrewsoaps.etsy.com

Thank you all for your great advice. I will stick to selling only my tried and true soap for now. I just made my first batch of lotion today with my daughter and grandson and we had a lot of fun. The lotion turned out pretty nice, although I think we may have used too much Vit E (1oz to 51oz total liquids) not sure, but it is nice. I went with the Liquapar Optima because I had it on hand, but I will go paraben free from now on. I used .25 oz so I pray I did not use too much. I purchased some Snowdrift tester kit for now, but I will not sell any products without testing first. The quote I received from a lab was 3,000 to 5,000 I almost fell out of my chair. Again thank you all!

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Four Seasons Fine Handcrafted Soaps
& Specialties, Inc.
Laugh, Love, Live!

Liquapar Optima is used between 0.5 - 1%. How big of a batch did you make?

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

Soap Buddy~
Maybe you can help me here. I had purchased the lotion making video, and the preservatives that is used it phenonip, which is a paraben presevative. I would much rather use optiphen in its place. But this is not addressed directly in the video, other then to state that it is a "little trickier" to use. Would you know where I could find out how to use optiphen instead, and how?

Secondly... I would also like to use some other butters/oils (i.e. mango butter/avocado butter) in my recipe. I am about to place my third order, and because the lotion kit has preservatives and fragrances I do not want to use, I will have to buy these items seperately. (I guess I need to contact Anne-Marie to see if the lotion book gives other recipes and methods.. huh? ) Since you are a great source of recipe links, do you have a link for other lotion recipes? Would be mighty appreciative...
Thanks bunchs
juls

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JKM Creative Enterprises

You can sub one oil for another or one butter for another. I don't have Anne-Marie's formula, so I don't know what's in it. Here are a couple of places that have recipes for lotion.
http://www.theherbarie.com/The-Formulary-p-7.html
http://www.snowdriftfarm.com/formulary.html
http://www.lotioncrafter.com/lotioncraf ... ulary.html

Optiphen is used at the very last stage of lotion making. It is best to add when the mixture is below 120-130 degrees.
Recommended use levels: 0.5 - 1.5%. The INCI is: Phenoxyethanol (and) Caprylyl Glycol. This is the correct way to list it on your label.

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

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JKM Creative Enterprises

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

_________________
Four Seasons Fine Handcrafted Soaps
& Specialties, Inc.
Laugh, Love, Live!

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