Why Does It Matter?

Gluten free soap, artisan soap, virgin coconut oil soap, extra virgin olive oil soap, hypoallergenic soap and whatever soaps are all instruments for cleansing the body.  But if mere cleansing is what a person is after, then cheap commercial bar soaps and detergent-based liquid and bar soaps remain abundant throughout the marketplace.  These high-tech manufactured commercial soaps do indeed accomplish their cleansing tasks, but at what cost to human skin?  

Our gluten free soap is made using the cold process soap method.  The reason that method is significant is because properly made cold process soap bars naturally retain all of the inherent nutrients and glycerin from the oils themselves.  Glycerin is a valued natural humectant that attracts and holds moisture to the skin.  Cheap commercial soaps, on the other hand, are stripped of their valuable glycerin so it can be sold elsewhere for a higher profit, leaving the bars only good for one thing…basic cleaning.    Some companies try to add back a tiny amount of what was taken out so they can advertise moisturizing benefits, but as most customers soon discover, the soaps remain largely harsh anyway.  

Commercial soaps and detergent based soaps are traditionally scented with extremely strong artificial perfumes and colored with industrial dyes.  These chemical perfumes and dyes may spawn clever marketing campaigns, but are wreaking havoc with more and more people, with troubling new skin allergies cropping up everywhere.  If the soap is also not a gluten free soap or a hypoallergenic soap, other serious sensitivities can come into play as well.  

We use genuine essential oils to create our beautiful Soapcakes fragrances and pure clays for lovely muted colors from the earth.  

Because little or no superfatting occurs in most commercial soaps, cleansing is aggressively accomplished at a fairly high pH level.    This leaves the skin temporarily stripped, damaged, dry and vulnerable until it can somehow manage to repair itself before the next shower or bath.  As would be expected, this might surely contribute to troubled skin, or at the very least, accelerated aging of the skin.  This damage has also launched a whole new lucrative industry, skin crèmes and lotions, some of which contain the very glycerin that was taken out of the soap in the first place!  

Cold process soap, on the other hand, is traditionally made as a superfatted product.  Superfatting in cold process soap means that a higher percentage of fats (oils) is used than what is needed to completely saponify with the amount of lye used.   If cold process soap is made properly, this superfatting discount is a wonderful insurance policy against harshness, as well as potentially adding a certain skin-loving value to the soap’s use.  Properly made cold process soap allows a gentle, but thorough cleansing to the skin without all the harshness usually attributed to commercial soaps, while leaving a valuable trace moisture-saving layer of oil in its wake.   And if that oil happens to also be in the form of unrefined gourmet oils and butters, then the potential nutrient value of the moisture-saving layer is obviously much higher.

We produce our gluten free soap with the finest butters and oils that money can buy.  Each Soapcake reflects our passion that soap should not assault the skin while it cleanses and should provide as much skin-loving value as possible from the entire cleansing process.  Once you experience the huge difference between our skillfully made cold process soap and the commercial soaps you may be using, we predict that you will have great difficulty ever going back…

…because we think it truly matters what you put on your skin.