In my quest to making soap I ran into some interesting information. I thought I would share, maybe you already knew this, I didn't. Store bought soap vs handmade soap, is there a difference?
When you think of soap what words come to mind? You think of "cleaning", "homemade or store bought", "cheap or expensive". Did you know though, that even though it is labeled a "soap" it really is not the same product at all? It's a solidified detergent.
For now, when I refer to "homemade soap", I am referring to a lye soap. What I make. There are different kinds of soap, like a glycerin or “melt and pour”, but a lye soap is about 90% oils, depending on the recipe, and a liquid and lye. This kind of soap contains oils that have different cleansing properties. For instance, Coconut oil which has anti-bacterial properties, but also produces bubbles and hardness in the bar. Some oils clean, while others make a harder bar, some oils are just nourishing to the skin. With each oil they carry the water to hydrate the skin. If you add in goats milk, you have just amplified the benefits a huge amount. Goats milk adds many nourishing benefits like vitamins, amino acids and alpha hydroxy acids to name a few, these get sucked in thru the skin to actually heal and rebuild. Goats milk has a wonderful moisturizing ability, and you can really feel a difference.
Store bought soap is a hardened detergent. It cleans by stripping everything from the skin including your natural oils. It contains many chemicals which, like homemade soap, get sucked into the skin. They may add in things like aloe vera, vitamin E that make you think they are good for your skin, but its counterproductive because the detergent just takes it away. So why is this considered a detergent and not a soap?
Here is the clincher.... when they make soap, they continue the process by extracting the glycerin out of it. Glycerin is the moisturizing component of the soap. Do you know “why” they do this?
They take the extracted glycerin and make lotion because they KNOW that after you have stripped the skin you will NEED to add back on some lotion to help moisturize and relieve the dry skin. Pretty smart huh? Instead of getting you to buy 1 product they have now forced you into buying another.
The interesting things you learn when you research.
