A change at Soakind!
How it all began:
When I started making bath products back in 2019 I focused on making fun bath bombs for my children, and natural bars of soap for the whole family. Having suffered from eczema all my life I personally could not tolerate most perfumed products that could be bought in high street shops. Instead, I relied on pharmacy bought creams, lotions and shower substitutes, including many products that contain cortisone and steroids.
Having three small children, including one who seemed to follow my path of having sensitive skin, I started to pay more attention to the chemical ingredients in all their ‘fun’ bath products and with now five family members I also became aware of just how much plastic rubbish we accumulate in our house!
For me personally, bath and shower time had never been a fun experience as a child or a pampering one as an adult as the products often made my skin too dry, itchy or resulted in flare ups. Instead, I got used to relying solely on the fragrance-free, boring white products prescribed by my (lovely) GPs. So, 2019 felt like it was time to change things!
(I will be sharing more about the various aspects of ingredients in bath bombs, soaps and other skincare in future posts, including the reasons why there is a general absence of bath bombs on the website at the moment!)
My very first soap that I had legally assessed for safely was a completely natural, unfragranced, uncolored banana oat soap. And there was a reason for it – the ingredients, especially the oat flakes, are so, so good for sensitive skin! This soap marked the beginning of Soakind – skincare that is (so) kind to the skin!
Over the years, my range has expanded to the point that I now have hundreds of products that have been tested, insurend and legally certified to be sold. However, my eczema and allergies did not agree with several of the fragrance oils I used, meaning I had to stop making certain products.
As someone who has spent years dealing with allergies, having had severe allergic reactions resulting in trips to A&E and the use of an Epipen, having done exclusion diets etc you’d think I’d know it all by now. And yet, it was only in the last couple of years that I started to really understand the main issues. It’s not just ‘perfumed products’ or ‘fragrances’. It is specific allergens in fragrances that cause reactions! I am keen to help people understand which allergen exactly they are reacting to. I am not a doctor and I don’t offer allergy testing (although I let you in on a secret – even thorough allergy testing does not give you a detailed answer other than: allergic to fragrances, and I had to wait 1.5 years to get just that result). However, I can guide you towards specific products to hopefully help you find out what works for you.
To help with all this I am now focusing on creating specific products that contain ‘allergen-free’ fragrance oils! There are some fragrances that have such tiny amounts of allergens that they are classified as having ‘no declarable allergens’ and then there are those that have no allergens in their detailed allergen declaration forms that comply with Cosmetic and Detergent regulations. As a consumer, you don’t get to see those documents, but as makers we all have (and must have) these, so I will know exactly what % of which allergen is in which product! So please do ask!
If a product carries my new ‘allergen-free’ symbol, it means that this particular product either has NO fragrance added to it or that their allergen declaration shows that it does not contain an allergen.
‘No declarable allergen’ means that the % of any possible allergen is below 0.01% in wash off products (like soap) or less than 0.1% in leave on products (like body butters).
Essential oils sadly do contain allergens.
I will create separate posts on the allergens people most likely react to and will explain allergens in more detail, but for now I am pleased to say that Soakind is focusing on allergen-free products, and I am happy to help with questions where I can!
We have recently had a whole new range of whipped soaps legally certified that are all allergen-free! Berry Berry Good is the first one of these, and they are now available online!
More to share soon!
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