Do you have any questions for us?

Wet the bar under the shower, then gently rub it between your hands or your hair until you create a good foam. Massage the foam and the bar over your hair and scalp until you have good coverage. Rinse off as normal. If you have particularly long or dirty hair you may need to rub it over the scalp a little more to work up enough foam.

It is good to store your bar in a dry place where it can easily drain (we recommend a drainable soap dish on a window sill). Otherwise, it will tend to become soft and disintegrate if left in water.

Yes, it’s pH balanced for skin so is fine to use over the whole body. Read more: It’s is perfectly safe to use on your body, if a bit of an expensive way to wash yourself! Because we are 100% soap free, it is more compatible with the pH of skin and won’t dry out your skin (which traditional soaps can do). Point to note: If other bars do not claim to be soap free then they probably aren’t.

Some of the ingredients in our bar are created partly or wholly using an all-natural fermentation process (as opposed to chemical synthesis). Read more: For the environment: Fermentation is an exceedingly green method of production, with reliance on 100% renewable, local sources. Its waste products are green, the solid mass being used as animal feed, water recycled and CO2 is taken up the following year by the planted crop. In short, these ingredients are carbon neutral. For your scalp: Our scalp microbiome is a film of (amongst other things) live bacteria and yeast all in balance with each other. When this balancing act goes wrong our scalp is prone to such problems as a dry, itchy scalp or dandruff. Trials have shown that fermented ingredients help support our microbiome balance so helping support a healthy scalp and beautiful shiny hair(i). Sophorolipids (the biosurfactants that we have in our bar) have also been shown to reduce the yeast Malassezia, which has been linked to dandruff. References i.pharmaceutics-12-01099-v2.pdf

Just like normal shampoo this might sting. Wash it out with plenty of warm water – that should do the trick. In the unlikely event that your symptoms persist, seek medical advice.

For an 100g shampoo bar it should last you approximately 60 - 80 washes. This obviously depends on the length of your hair, how dirty your hair is and how soft or hard your water is. You will have saved 3 plastic bottles using our one bar. The same is for a 50g conditioner bar (even though it's smaller, you go through it less quickly).

Going solid you have all the benefits of liquid shampoo but without the liquid. This reduces transporting liquid across the country (so reducing carbon emissions) and eliminates the need for a plastic bottle to store it. It’s a win for your hair and a win for the world. Also, it’s easier for you to pack and carry.

None of our bars claim to be allergy free, although they are very gentle. All allergens are listed in bold on our ingredients list on the packet. They are manufactured in a place that also manufactures nuts and oils (including sesame seed oil). We cannot guarantee that they are free from traces of the above.

We do NOT contain the following: Sulphates (SLS & SLES) - these are very strong detergents which often take all of your natural oils from the scalp when the shampoo is rinsed out. Parabens – these work as a preservative; however some studies have shown them to be linked with an increase in growth of breast cancer cells. PEG – Polyethylene Glycols – these work as thickening agents, and are often contaminated with by-products. Diethanolamine (DEA) and Triethanolamine (TEA) - studies have linked the topical application of DEA and cancer in animals, but the effects on humans are unclear. Anyway, you won’t find these in any shampoos in the UK as the European Commission has banned DEA in cosmetics. Quats – also known as polyquaterniums which include quaternium –15 – this works as a preservative and has been shown to be absorbed through the skin in animal studies and are linked with skin sensitization and skin irritation. Synthetic colours – we figured colours, while fun, are really just another unnecessary chemical, so our bars are all a natural white. Dimethicone – this is a type of silicone which can cause build up on your hair. Cocamidopropyl Betaine – a wonderful foam booster but has been linked with skin irritant, allergies, rosacea and eczema. Triclosan- a chemical antibacterial agent that has been linked with hormone disruptions Retinyl Palmitate – a known skin irritant that can cause peeling, scaling, redness and itching. Sodium Chloride – this is the chemical name for salt, it’s added to some shampoos as a thickener. It can make an already sensitive scalp dry and itchy.

It certainly is! And what’s more you have saved 3 plastic bottles and 0.25 x sq meters of virgin rainforest in using our bar (1). Not only is it recyclable, but because it has been printed with vegetable inks, you can pop it on your compost heap too without any worry that when it breaks down it will leak anything dangerous into your soil! Our packaging company is proud to claim the following certification FSC – Forest Stewardship Council PEFC – Programmed for the Endorsement of Forest Certification ISO 14001 – Internationally agreed standards World Land Trust. 1.https://www.curtispackaging.co.uk/sustainable-packaging

All of the ingredients in our bar are there for two reasons: they have minimal negative environmental impact and they do brilliant things for the health of your hair. Adding colours to the bars, while looking fun, doesn’t improve the cleansing power, nourishing ability or anything else that we want from a shampoo bar. Read more: What’s more, colour in shampoo bars usually comes from a mineral called mica. To obtain mica it must be mined and unfortunately the mica industry has been plagued by reports of illegal child labour. While there are initiatives being set up to stop these abuses, being a small company, we weren’t confident that we could be absolutely certain of the source of our mica so we decided to stay away. In fact, even much larger companies have struggled with the issue of the ethical sourcing of mica. When discovering some troubling issues with the sourcing of mica in one of its Indian mines, Lush said it didn’t have “the purchasing power or local knowledge” to stay and make a difference so, in 2014, it committed to remove all traces of natural mica from its products. It did this by switching to synthetic mica, but later found that this also had traces of natural mica in it. “We had no idea just how difficult it would be,” said Stephanie Boyd, the company’s PR manager.

Soap is made from the saponificaton of sodium hydroxide with an oil, this produces a high alkaline product (usually pH of 9-10). Our bar is made from a combination of several plant based cleansers, bio fermented products and conditioning agents. The end product has a lower pH more compatible with skin. Read more: The skin has a barrier known as the acid mantle2. This is a thin, slightly acidic (pH 4.5 - 6.2) film lying on the surface of the skin which acts as a barrier to viruses, bacteria and environmental pollutants etc. It is made up of lipids including ceramides and free fatty acids – which help maintain the optimal amount of healthy bacteria and flora on the skin, keeping it hydrated and protected. Every time we wash our skin in a more alkaline environment, we disrupt this balance (3,4,5). Healthy skin can usually return to the normal acidic state quite quickly, however the closer your product is to the pH of skin, the easier it is for the skin to rebalance again and get on with the job of protecting you. When making a bar of soap, sodium hydroxide (also known as lye) is added to fats or oils. A chemical reaction ensues known as saponification. This produces a solid soap bar with a pH of 9-10. We think this is fine for your hands but not your body or scalp. Our bar also known as a syndet bar is a combination of several gentle plant-based surfactants (cleansers) combined with some bio fermented ingredients and conditioning agents (made via fermentation). This produces a bar with a pH much closer to your skin and scalp. This way there is less damage to your scalp and hair. 1. Braun-Falco O, Korting HC. Normal pH value of human skin. Hautarzt. 1986;37:126–9. [PubMed] [Google Scholar] 2. Gehring W, Gehsen M, Zimmerman V, Gloor M. Effects of pH changes in a specific detergent multicomponent emulsion on the water content of stratum corneum. J Soc Cosmet Chem. 1991;42:327–33.[Google Scholar] 3. Baranda L, González-Amaro R, Torres-Alvarez B, Alvarez C, Ramírez V. Correlation between pH and irritant effect of cleansers marketed for dry skin. Int J Dermatol. 2002;41:494–9. [PubMed] [Google Scholar] 4&5 Korting HC, Kober M, Mueller M, Braun-Falco O. Influence of repeated washings with soap and synthetic detergents on pH and resident flora of the skin of forehead and forearm. Results of a cross-over trial in health probationers. Acta Derm Venereol. 1987;67:41–7. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Yes it is, no animal products are used in the manufacture of any of our bars.

Yes, our bar is manufactured by a family run business in North Wales.