What are they made from?
Packaging - Aluminium screw-top bottle and a paper label. Please re-use/recycle the bottle.
Liquid Soap ingredients:
- Pure – Ingredients: Aqua, Potassium Olivate, Potassium Rapeseedate, Vegetable Glycerine, Potassium Canolate.
- Grapefruit – Ingredients: Aqua, Potassium Olivate, Potassium Rapeseedate, Vegetable Glycerine, Potassium Canolate, (Citrus Paradisi) Grapefruit Essential Oil. *Limonene, *Geraniol, *Linalool, *Citronellal. *Naturally occurring in essential oils.
- Glacier – Ingredients: Aqua, Potassium Olivate, Potassium Cocoate, Vegetable Glycerine, Potassium Rapeseedate, (Rosmarinus Officinalis) Rosemary Essential Oil, (Mentha Piperita) Peppermint Essential Oil. *Limonene, *Linalool. *Naturally occurring in essential oils.
- Orange blossom – Ingredients: Aqua, Potassium Olivate, Potassium Rapeseedate, Vegetable Glycerine, Potassium Canolate, (Citrus Paradisi) Bergamot Essential Oil, (Citrus bergamia), Neroli Essential Oil, (Citrus aurantium) *Limonene, *Geraniol, *Linalool, *Citronellal. *Naturally occurring in essential oils.
Where do they come from?
Handmade in the UK.
Are they sustainable?
Olive oil – Olive oil does have some environmental issues within its production, mainly due to intensive farming methods. However, a lot of olive oil farming is still done by small scale farmers using traditional methods, which is much better environmentally.
Rapeseed oil – looking into it.
Coconut oil – Coconut oil - seems to be ok.
Vegetable glycerine – or glycerol is derived from vegetable matter, generally plants such as soy, coconut or palm to name a few. Determining the exact source of the glycerine isn’t always obvious, but Little Blue Hen Soaps do not use any palm oil or its derivatives in their products, so rest assured! The source of the vegetable glycerine will be the other oils mentioned in the ingredients such as coconut and rapeseed. Vegetable glycerine can be used as an ingredient in food, but in this case, where it is used in a beauty product, it is used to make the product smoother and helps keep it moist, so it doesn’t dry up so quickly, as well as making the product moisturising.
Essential oils - Essential oil production generally uses steam distillation which has no environmental concerns, but it takes a lot of plant to make only a small amount of essential oil.
Grapefruit – An accidental hybrid between oranges and pomelos rather than a naturally occurring fruit. It is called ‘grape’ fruit because it grows in groups like grapes do. China grows the most grapefruit, followed by the US and Mexico. Grapefruit can be grown organically, but as with most organic produce, it only makes up a small percent of the market currently, although demand for organic produce is growing. The oil is made by cold pressing the rind, which is the least energy intensive method of extracting oil generally.
Rosemary – no problems as far as I can tell.
Peppermint – Peppermint oil seems fine.
Oranges - In terms of the farming of this fruit, citrus plantations tend to be managed nowadays as an intensive monoculture, (although a lot of crops are famed this way now, bring back crop rotation!) which causes soil erosion. This type of farming while effective for crop growing, has caused problems with the land and has even led to over-production (wasted food). The making of orange oil is not environmentally damaging as essential oil production generally uses steam distillation which has no environmental concerns, but it takes a lot of plant to make only a small amount of essential oil.
Neroli – The essential oil Neroli, along with orange blossom essential oil, are both made from the blossoms of the ‘Bitter Orange’ tree. Neroli is extracted using steam distillation, which gives it a slightly different scent to orange blossom essential oil, which is extracted another way using the enfleurage method. (A process which uses animal fats to capture fragrance. Not widely used in essential oil production any more, but be aware of the process used to make different essential oils if you are vegan. Neroli is the vegan version just to be clear.) The blossoms to produce this essential oil are usually collected by hand. It is mainly grown in North Africa - the biggest producers of neroli are Morocco and Tunisia. Neroli is an extremely popular fragrance, (and possibly a secret ingredient in coca cola if the rumours are true) so demand for this product is high, and it takes around 1000 pounds of orange blossoms to create just one pound of oil.
Bergamot – Bergamot is a citrus fruit which looks like a green orange. It takes around 100 bergamot fruits to get about 85g of essential oil. Which is not too bad as far as essential oil production goes! Mainly grown in Southern Europe, especially Italy, and North Africa. Seems like the Italians are quite proud of this crop and much of it is grown organically in the same places as it has been farmed for many generations.
How about ethical?
Little Blue Hen Soap has this to say on their website about their ethics:
‘Little Blue Hen Soap is a 100% vegan business from practice to product that is super conscious about ethical practices and products, protecting the environment, all creatures and the planet as a whole. Little Blue Hen Soap is progressive by nature and recently evolved into a plastic-free products business. Endorsed by Naturewatch Foundation UK the leading and proactive organisation against animal testing. This means we can guarantee you 100% that there is no animal exploitation involved in our product making, right down to the source of our ingredients, suppliers and other materials we use in the productions of The Little Blue Hen Soap Crafting Company as a whole. The soaps are handcrafted by traditional cold process & tested on obliging enthusiastic humans to make sure the soap is as lovely and gentle as it should be. The natural glycerine is retained in the soap which adds to the natural conditioning properties along with the plant oils of olive and coconut oils.’
Extra good stuff:
Little Blue Hen Soap state that their business is:
‘100% Vegan business from practice to products. Environmentally biodegradable, recycled/recyclable materials. Free from plastic, palm oil and its derivatives, synthetic perfumes and other unnecessary harsh ingredients. Free from SLS, triclosan, parabens, phthalates and petroleum derivatives. Every product is assessed & certified by a chartered chemist to comply with the current EU Regulations. Public liability and indemnity insurance covered. All documents available on request.’
Conclusion –
Doesn’t this castile soap scrub up well? Plastic may well be convenient as a packaging solution, but really, what can be more convenient than an all-in-one concentrated cleaning product like this? When it comes to simplicity, this liquid soap cleans the floor of all other overpackaged cleaning products. Plastic, I wash my hands of you. Begone!