Palm Free Goats Milk Soap Slices

We're pleased to announce that our handmade palm free soap slices have now been added to The Natural Soapworks website. We're really proud of these, since they use a new formulation of our popular goats milk soap. It's a really creamy, bubbly soap made even better by the lack of palm oil in the formulation, so they are completely orangutan friendly soaps! They are pretty soaps too, with delicate aromatherapy blends of essential oils.

These are slightly larger soaps, at 120g each, sliced from a log and hand decorated with pretty botanicals. We hope you enjoy using them!

Sustainable palm oil and the plight of the orangutan

We wanted to add a brief note regarding the BBC's Panorama 'Dying for a biscuit' programme which was screened in the UK earlier this evening. It gave a good insight into the issues surrounding the palm oil industry, and the effect palm oil plantations are having on the habitat of the wild orangutan and other animal species. Further information on the palm oil trade can be found in this article on the BBC's website.

We'd like to re-emphasise to our customers, that we have already taken steps to only source palm oil from a sustainable source (in Colombia) for use in our handmade soaps. We have also undertaken extensive product development, to successfully develop a luxury palm-free soap formulation which is the basis for our new range of contemporary soap slices. As the programme highlighted, it isn't always easy to care for the environment when the supply chain for botanical oils is so difficult to regulate. But we hope that in some small way, our efforts will highlight that companies can take steps to ensure they do not contribute to the demise of the wild orangutan.

If you have been troubled by what you have seen and would like to help BOS UK (Borneo Orangutan Survival), remember that we continue to sell our charity soap. Or you can visit the BOS website for information on how you can directly contribute towards their work to rescue and rehabilitate orphaned orangutans in Borneo.

Orang 2 palm-free goat's milk soap

This is a quick note to mention that Orang 2, our new palm-free orangutan friendly soap, is now ready for sale!

A couple of weeks ago we told you about how the very first batch of Orang 2 soap had been donated to Borneo Orangutan Survival UK. We're very pleased to say that it seems to be selling well at the BOS UK events.

Our own batch of this brand new soap has completed it's curing period, so it has been added to the charity page of The Natural Soapworks website. So if you'd like to one of the first to try out this lovely sweet but citrussy natural goat's milk soap, please visit: http://www.naturalsoapworks.co.uk/CharitySkincare.aspx and £1 from the sale of each Orang 2 bar will be donated to BOS UK!

Our first palm-free soap is donated to BOS!

We're delighted to announce that we've finally cracked it! We've successfully re-formulated our luxurious goat's milk soap so it's now palm-free. You cannot imagine how excited we are about this, since it's taken over 12 months of testing to finally achieve the perfect formulation.

As you know, we're perfectionists when it comes to soap so we had a pretty long list of demands from this new soap...and we love the result! It's still a hard bar, still has a luxurious creamy lather, still looks beautiful, still smells gorgeous, and it's still packed with natural ingredients and goat's milk so it still feels like our soap!! (draws breath) BUT most importantly it lacks palm oil in it's formulation! Can you tell that we're over the moon with this soap?

It seemed only right that Borneo Orangutan Survival (BOS) UK should receive the first palm-free batch, since they have been our inspiration for removing palm oil from our soaps. Therefore we've donated the first 50 bars to BOS UK, and created a brand new ‘Orang 2’ palm-free goat’s milk soap to celebrate this important landmark for The Natural Soapworks. Just look at that lovely pile of soap.....

'Orang 2' is a lovely sweet but citrussy bar, containing a blend of citrus and ho leaf essential oils. Ho leaf has lovely floral but woody notes, but is the ecological substitute for rosewood. 'Orang 2' also features a pretty swirled pattern of natural clay, and as usual each bar is decorated with our hairy string and a BOS label. Every penny raised from the sale of this first batch will go to BOS UK, so Grainne and the team will be selling these bars at forthcoming BOS UK events. We'd just ask that anyone who gets the chance to buy one of these bars - please give generously, so as much money as possible can be raised for this wonderful charity.

Our own batch of 'Orang 2' is still maturing, and will be available in the studio and on our websites in a couple of weeks. As before, we guarantee that £1 from the sale of each bar will be sent to BOS UK in support of Lone, and everyone in the Nyaru Menteng team. For a while we'll still be using up the last of our supplies of organic sustainable palm oil, but then soap production will be switched over to this very 'orangutan friendly' new formulation. Our BOS soap page is: http://www.naturalsoapworks.co.uk/CharitySkincare.aspx

Natural Soapworks Favourites

We've noticed that quite a few of our customers are ordering from the Natural Soapworks and Natroma websites at the same time. This is great, since we can combine postage and despatch everything in the same parcel. But it's not so convenient for the customer since you end up placing two orders instead of one.

So we're very pleased to introduce Natural Soapworks Favourites to the Natroma website: http://www.natroma.co.uk/store/d20-natural-soapworks-favourites/

This is a new section on the site, which will feature some of our most popular soaps, lip balms and bathing items so these can be purchased at the same time as Natroma natural skincare items. We hope you enjoy this added convenience and as a special introductory offer, until 30th April 2009 quote: SOAPWORKS at the checkout to claim a 5% discount off your order!

What's so special about goat’s milk soap?

It’s a question we’re asked most weeks! We can guarantee that anyone who asks, has never tried a goat’s milk soap before. We’ll try to explain why we think goat’s milk soap is special…

Goat’s milk soap is more difficult to make than a typical handmade bar, since the milk affects the saponification process. We use real goat’s milk (not powdered) since it contains proteins, amino acids and Vitamin A to nourish and soften the skin. You may read some articles which claim that natural goat’s milk soap has the same pH as the skin. We’d disagree with this claim, since soap is a naturally alkaline substance, so it’s doubtful if a natural soap could become slightly acidic without the addition of chemicals.

Our formulation has come about after years of perfecting our soap recipe. The brief was to create a hard, long-lasting bar with a rich, creamy lather whilst being highly moisturizing and skin-kind too. Okay, we admit that we’re perfectionists so that’s why it’s taken a few years to create our recipe!

It’s no accident that our soap contains many botanical oils and butters (such as olive, coconut, shea and cocoa) and these had to be carefully balanced to produce the rich texture and foaming qualities we were looking for. We also use a cold-process saponification manufacturing process and use traditional handmade wooden moulds. Each new soap is matured for 4-8 weeks so it hardens and becomes mild before it is presented for sale. So the next time you try a new natural soap remember that each recipe will be different, since the skilled soap maker crafts their recipe to produce particular results.

So what can you expect from a Natural Soapworks goat’s milk soap? The first thing people always do, is give the bar a sniff! Fragranced with pure essential oils, each soap variety has its own special character, and this adds to the pleasure of using the soap each day. We also love pretty soaps, so we use natural clays and spices to add colour and we often swirl them through the soap so each bar has unique patterns. The goat’s milk gives a unique, creamy lather that’s so rich that it can be used for shaving or as a natural body wash. The soap suits delicate skin conditions, and people who visit our little shop are often invited to try washing their hands before making a purchase. Most people are impressed by the conditioning feel of the lather, and everyone comments on how soft their skin feels after just one wash. So we’d sum up our goat’s milk soaps as being pretty and fragrant, but very functional and full of top quality ingredients.

Tempted to give it a try? Visit out Goat’s Milk Soap page if you’d like more details:

http://www.naturalsoapworks.co.uk/GoatSoaps.aspx

BOS UK and Orangutan Diary

It seems only right that our first post should be about Borneo Orangutan Survival UK. We've proudly supported this wonderful charity since the begining of 2008, when The Natural Soapworks took the decision to only use organic palm oil from a sustainable source in Columbia to make our soaps.

So what's the problem with palm oil and the significance of it being from a sustainable source, you may wonder? Well soapmakers use palm oil because it adds hardness to a bar of soap, and it's used as a botanical alternative to tallow (rendered animal fats, which we certainly wouldn't use). But the problem with palm oil sourced from the Far East, is that it tends to be grown on palm plantations which have been planted after the rain forest has been cut down and burnt. This is causing catastrophic damage to the environment, and as the forests are destroyed it means that the local animals die too.

You'll find palm oil in all manner of products on our supermarket shelves (e.g. crisps, cakes, chocolate, biscuits, cosmetics, detergents, soaps etc), and there's even more problems on the horizon due to the interest in bio fuels. Unless action is taken soon, more and more habitat will be destroyed and ultimately this could lead to the extinction of many animal species.

When we discovered that even in a small way we were contributing to such destruction, we decided to act quickly to find some palm oil that is grown in a responsible and sustainable way, that doesn't endanger the environment. Organic sustainable palm oil is more expensive but we think it’s the right thing to include in our soaps. This is because one of the worst things that we discovered about palm oil, was the impact it's having on the orangutan populations in Sumatra and Borneo. There's a serious risk that one of our closest cousins will be wiped out within 10 years.

We were so concerned about this, that we contacted Borneo Orangutan Survival (BOS UK) and they confirmed that our soap is "orangutan friendly". This very worthwhile charity works to rescue and rehabilitate orphaned orangutans in Borneo, whose mother's are killed as the rainforest is cleared. BOS's work, led by Lone Droscher Nielsen, is featured in the Orangutan Diary screened by the BBC in 2007, and now back for a second series on BBC2. We wanted to help this fabulous charity so we have adopted 2 orphaned orangutans, and fund raise to support BOS by attending events and selling our ‘Orang’ soap. We guarantee that £1.00 from the sale of each bar of 'Orang' goes straight to BOS UK. http://www.naturalsoapworks.co.uk/CharitySkincare.aspx

So how we all help? It's all about the purchasing power of the consumer, and we'd encourage everyone to try to find products that have sustainably sourced palm ingredients within them. To find out more about helping to save the orangutan visit the BOS UK website: http//www.savetheorangutan.co.uk/index.php