Highland Soap Co. Natural Shaving Soap.

henkverhaar said:
Oh come on, please, and stduy some real soap and cosmetics science before you start blabbering chemical nonsense.
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if your skin is as strong as an ox then maybe you're fine, if unfortunately you have sensitive skin like me shaving soaps are very important as I don't want the hassle of having to apply aftershave products to moisturise, soothe and heal my skin afterwards!

I agree with other reply's that what works for someone is all that matters.

By the way I just noticed you actually make and sell shaving soap, sorry I didn't catch this before. As you have strong opinions may I ask why you don't publish your products full ingredients on you website? My guess and I might be wrong here is because it might contain sodium laureth sulfate or similar to fake the lather? Or gone down the tallowate route then added a perfume to mask the nasty smell of the cheap base/waste oils. But please accept my apologies here if I am wide off the mark.
 
Chris P. said:
henkverhaar said:
Oh come on, please, and stduy some real soap and cosmetics science before you start blabbering chemical nonsense.
Click to expand...

if your skin is as strong as an ox then maybe you're fine, if unfortunately you have sensitive skin like me shaving soaps are very important as I don't want the hassle of having to apply aftershave products to moisturise, soothe and heal my skin afterwards!

I agree with other reply's that what works for someone is all that matters.

By the way I just noticed you actually make and sell shaving soap, sorry I didn't catch this before. As you have strong opinions may I ask why you don't publish your products full ingredients on you website? My guess and I might be wrong here is because it might contain sodium laureth sulfate or similar to fake the lather? Or gone down the tallowate route then added a perfume to mask the nasty smell of the cheap base/waste oils. But please accept my apologies here if I am wide off the mark.
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ONLY ONE WAY TO FIND OUT WHO IS THE WINNER HERE......

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PuO0LnxZrxs[/youtube]
 
Chris P. said:
henkverhaar said:
Oh come on, please, and stduy some real soap and cosmetics science before you start blabbering chemical nonsense.
Click to expand...

if your skin is as strong as an ox then maybe you're fine, if unfortunately you have sensitive skin like me shaving soaps are very important as I don't want the hassle of having to apply aftershave products to moisturise, soothe and heal my skin afterwards!

I agree with other reply's that what works for someone is all that matters.

By the way I just noticed you actually make and sell shaving soap, sorry I didn't catch this before. As you have strong opinions may I ask why you don't publish your products full ingredients on you website? My guess and I might be wrong here is because it might contain sodium laureth sulfate or similar to fake the lather? Or gone down the tallowate route then added a perfume to mask the nasty smell of the cheap base/waste oils. But please accept my apologies here if I am wide off the mark.
Click to expand...

Shoot. I wrote a lengthy reply, and when posting it, I lost my connection.

I'll redo briefly: first of all, check out my article (sticky) on here, on shaving soap ingredients. If you want to know exactly what's in my shaving soap, it's all on the ingredient list on my label. And no, you cannot make a shaving soap (or improve it) by relying on SLS or SLeS, which incidentally are not bad per se, and certainly not bad for you skin, at least not more than other degreasing agents of similar emulsifying strength (whether detergents, or soaps, etc.).

SLS and SLeS are used as the basis of many, if not most, synthetic detergents (syndets), including washing up liquids, shampoos, and many toilet 'soap' bars, because they offer improved degreasing action, and do not deteriorate in or generate / leave soap scum with hard water.

Nothing wrong with tallowates either - you should probably check what a tallowate actually is. In fact, tallowate is one of the better normal ingredients of traditional quality shaving soaps.

Skin irritation after shaving is, in most cases, the result of the abrasive action of shaving itself. It can be minimized, or avoided, by good technique. In the few cases where the irritation is caused by a soap, it is either because of its strong degreasing action (which is highly unlikely in a GOOD shaving soap, much more likely in any bath soap, including a 'fake' shaving soap like your Highland soap), or, more often, due to fragrance ingredients. If you truly have irritation from soap, you should try an unscented shaving soap.
 
thank you for your reply and I will check out your article, very helpful and much appreciated. Cheers


henkverhaar said:
henkverhaar said:
Oh come on, please, and stduy some real soap and cosmetics science before you start blabbering chemical nonsense.
Click to expand...

Shoot. I wrote a lengthy reply, and when posting it, I lost my connection.

I'll redo briefly: first of all, check out my article (sticky) on here, on shaving soap ingredients. If you want to know exactly what's in my shaving soap, it's all on the ingredient list on my label. And no, you cannot make a shaving soap (or improve it) by relying on SLS or SLeS, which incidentally are not bad per se, and certainly not bad for you skin, at least not more than other degreasing agents of similar emulsifying strength (whether detergents, or soaps, etc.).

SLS and SLeS are used as the basis of many, if not most, synthetic detergents (syndets), including washing up liquids, shampoos, and many toilet 'soap' bars, because they offer improved degreasing action, and do not deteriorate in or generate / leave soap scum with hard water.

Nothing wrong with tallowates either - you should probably check what a tallowate actually is. In fact, tallowate is one of the better normal ingredients of traditional quality shaving soaps.

Skin irritation after shaving is, in most cases, the result of the abrasive action of shaving itself. It can be minimized, or avoided, by good technique. In the few cases where the irritation is caused by a soap, it is either because of its strong degreasing action (which is highly unlikely in a GOOD shaving soap, much more likely in any bath soap, including a 'fake' shaving soap like your Highland soap), or, more often, due to fragrance ingredients. If you truly have irritation from soap, you should try an unscented shaving soap.
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I used to think I had sensitive skin........... until I stopped using balms and started using Arko/High alcohol splash.

Sorted the "sensitivity" right out.......... well that and an improved technique
 
Nah Hando, you know what I mean.

From the first day I switched from using Balms to using AS my 'prolonged irritation' stopped. It just worked for me, that's all.
 
I suppose the debate for me is what makes a 'real' shaving soap and maybe this has already been discussed as a thread in itself (so this post is probably in the wrong post) as reading through the forums quite a few 'real' shaving products mentioned contain loads of synthetics. My grandfather used to make his own shaving soap, mostly just saponified olive and castor oils then left to harden. It was still soft I think and didn't really lather but the creaminess gave a very good shave and left your skin healthy. I suppose in a similar way to using a shaving oil.

These days it just seems we have been told by marketers that we need this really thick lather for a good shave, and so all the products are packed full of chemicals to achieve it. I just believe simple is best, a real shaving soap for me is the way my grandfather used to make it, traditionally and with a few simple and natural ingredients- yep go ahead and add clay but again might be on the label to market the product. I understand what tallowate is - just another saponified oil made from tallow (animal fat) - but personally prefer olive - not waste animal fats as I have been to a merchant that produces the stuff - it stinks.

Tallowate is mostly a by product of the meat industry, and my understanding usually it comes from intensive factory farming (cheapest of the cheap) where intensive farming methods us growth hormones, antibiotics etc. to produce meat. I doubt it is 'free range' or organic tallowate! Hormones etc. are stored in fat, so I really don't like the idea of putting this stuff on my face. Tallowate is really only used these days in cheap mass produced toilet soaps, and yes some shaving soaps. Unless as I said the left over meat/animal fat is from a quality abattoir. For me personally, no thanks - not something I want to rub on my face in the morning.

They also use waste oils and animal fats collected from restaurants as you can't just send waste oils down the drain and into rivers etc., so in goes the caustic soda and it is reused. That is why it is so readily available and a very good cheap ingredient for mass produced products. Virgin olive oil on the other hand is very expensive and very good for skin so I personally wouldn't call a shaving soap 'fake' that is using it as the base ingredient.
 
Tallowate was used of old as a cheap source of fats that just happened to be excellent for making shaving soap (and other soaps). There are better starting materials though. Pure stearate makes a better shaving soap, and pure stearate is usually sourced from palm oil these days. There are also other, more expensive, vegetable oils that contain loads more stearate than tallow does. It is very well possible to make a traditional, high quality shaving soap without tallowate. Oh. BTW, those hormones do NOT end up in the storage fat (they are not nearly as fat-soluble as some contaminants ;-) , otherwise they wouldn't work - hormones need to stay in the circulation to reach their targets. I know this is an oversimplification, but it's just to indicate that tallow will not contain much (synthetic) hormones, even if from todays 'industrial' cows. Saponification will also degrade most of them. The tallow that I use is, BTW, food grade...

Your granddad probably used the correct lyes to convert olive oil and castor oil to (shaving) soap - with those lyes, olive and castor would not make an excellent lathering shaving soap (hence the low latherability) but still a functional one. The thick lather is basically required because one of the functions of a shaving lather is to moisten the beard hairs and to keep them moist - so the lather should be stable and not drying.

Oh and most decent shaving soaps that are made today, even industrially, are true soaps, rather than most other detergent products. Even many 'canned goo' products are in fact based on true soap as their main detergent ingredients: -check the ingredients list, or better, the patent literature...

Oh, and I use the term fake shaving soap for any soap that is made using the wrong lyes - so with a disregard for what truly makes a shaving soap a shaving soap. Virgin olive oil is a waste of oil as a soap ingredient (a pomace olive oil would be a much better starting material), but with the correct lyes, even olive oil would make a half decent shaving soap - although there still are better oils to use.
 
I just caught up with this thread and I am in two minds.
I love shea and cocoa butter, and there is a minimum of 10% of each in my shaving soaps. I am not a vegetarian, and believe that tallow is a very useful ingredient in shaving soap. However, I decided as a soap producer with a much larger 'foot print' not to use animal fats in any of my soaps for the reasons described of intensive farming, and all that it entails in terms of cruelty, lower food production per acre/ input etc. etc. etc. I am not aware of a source of organic tallow, so am presuming it is such a small market it is just thrown in with the mainstream stuff. Whilst it may be described as waste, if someone is buying it, that is supporting the meat industry and making it more profitable.
On the other side of the argument, unless all ingredients are organic, including plant ones, then their production can also be problematic. I use more palm oil than anything else, between both shaving and ordinary soap, and so that is organic and sustainably sourced in Columbia. So the Orangutangs are safe, but not sure what was living on the land where the palm is now being grown in Columbia........
I agree with Henk that most quality shaving soaps have more actual soap in them than the average bar of 'soap' for washing found on the supermarket shelves.
 
Given the amount of 'organic' beef hitting the market, both through specialized butcher shops and, these days, supermarkets, you'd think that there ought to be a relevantly sized supply of organic tallow. I think that there is just no demand for it at the moment, but that if we would start asking for it, it would become available - either from individual butchers, or on a larger scale, if the demand were somehow organized 'centrally'.
 
I'm sure that must be right Henk; however, as I am happy without it, I'm not about to start organising the 'Organic tallow loving soapmakers group' just yet. :lol:
 
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