How to Use a Shampoo Bar

 

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One bar is all you need. Really. Our shampoo bars are formulated to cleanse and nourish your scalp, your hair shaft and the rest of you too! They provide fabulous lather and gentle, quality, moisturizing care for your skin and scalp.

Acting not only as a concentrated shampoo and bar soap, they also make a great conditioner! You can literally throw out all your bottles and just go with this one bar—perfect for traveling! (You can even use our bars on hand washables when you are traveling!)

We recommend using a solid shampoo/body bar on your hair if you have soft water, but even if you don't, you can use our shampoo/body bar combos on your body with excellent results no matter what type of water you have.

  • For more information on "hard water vs. soft water" see our article HERE.
  • For possible solutions and options if you suspect you may have hard water, see our article HERE. 

When used with soft water and properly rinsed periodically with an acidic rinse (try our herbal infused vinegar rinse or our delightfully scented Citric  Acid Rinses in a convenient spray bottle), our bars will provide long term, beautiful, and safe results for your hair as well as your body. Read more about the important of an acidic rinse HERE.
(Please note that we do not recommend using our bars in your hair if you have hard water. The molecules in the soap tend to "grab" the minerals in the hard water and leave those deposits in your hair.)

Shampoo/body bars are an excellent green choice because they eliminate the need for a plastic bottle as well as the need for chemical preservatives necessary in liquid products. Most liquid shampoos are 97% water and include harsh surfactants such as sodium laurel sulfate (SLS), a cheap foam booster designed to give the illusion of being thick and rich. SLS “degreases” the hair, but in the process, irritates and dries out the scalp as well as strips the hair shaft of its natural oils. Does it really make sense to pay a lot of money for water mixed with a chemical cocktail that makes you dry and itchy? Using a eco-friendly, solid, biodegradable shampoo bar reduces use of plastic especially as our bars are wrapped in a paper wrapper, or come in a cardboard box. Packaging that will either decompose or can be recycled, this is a win-win situation. 

Another benefit of shampoo bars is that they are convenient! When traveling, the use of a shampoo bar vs liquid shampoo is going to omit the risk of mid-flight leaking, they take up less space and have less waste. Often, shampoo bottles can get slippery in the bath and shower, or the lids can be hard to open, but shampoo bars are easy to use. They also take up much less room in the bath or shower, which is great if you have limited space in your bathroom.

Our bars are concentrated, solid, good stuff, like organic jojoba oil, unrefined organic shea butter, mango butter, organic olive oil, sweet almond oil, babassu oil, and real, essential oil blends to delight your senses! Unfortunately there are some popular companies who are well known for their shampoo bars, but they use synthetic detergents (including Sodium Laureth Sulfate), in their shampoo bars. Our bars are biodegradable and therefore a wonderful choice when you are camping and washing up near fresh water lakes and streams. Some of our customers use them to wash their dogs! There are some essential oils which can be harmful to animals when applied directly to the skin or ingested, so even though the essential oils in our bars are not a large percentage of the finished product, we recommend our safe and beneficial Pet Shampoo Bar with specifically chosen ingredients as an effective option. We also have other shampoo bars listed HERE which are great alternatives if you'd prefer an essential oil free shampoo.

If you've never used a solid shampoo bar in your hair, you may wonder "how do I do that?" It's easy. Just get your hair wet, take the bar and rub it all over your scalp and hair. Put the bar down and work it into a wonderful lather. Rub a dub dub. Some people actually find that it works better for them to create a lather with the bar between their hands (not applying the shampoo bar directly to hair), and then using the lather to clean hair and scalp. Running fingers through hair with lather from scalp to ends and then rinsing really well. Whether you apply the bar directly to you hair, or create a lather and apply just the lather, will depend on what you feel works best for your hair. You'll also want to us an acidic rinse to help your hair transition to the natural ingredients in our shampoo bars, continue reading for more info.

You may find that the first time you use a shampoo/body bar in your hair it feels different. Using natural ingredients is not going to give you the same feeling chemically laden choices do because the natural oils are not being stripped away. In addition, your hair may require a transition process before it is fully free of all the other chemicals and residues from prior hair products. You can read more about this transition process HERE.  Try our Herbal Infused Vinegar Rinse or our Citric Acid Rinses in four delicious scents to make the process go more quickly!)

Once your hair dries, you will discover soft, textured, luxurious feeling hair. People who have curly or nappy hair love solid shampoo bars because they do not cause the same problems regular shampoos do for their curly hair. If you have naturally curly hair or a perm, I highly recommend the book, Curly Girl: The Handbook by Lorriane Massey. It is a very helpful guide that teaches curly heads how to keep their curls soft, manageable, and beautiful!

If you are going to use our shampoo/body bars as part of your hair care regimen, it is important to use a natural vinegar rinse  periodically. After washing your hair with one of our conditioning shampoo bars, either spritz a citric acid or herbal vinegar rinse all over damp hair and scalp. This step can be done before washing the rest of your body so the rinse can soak in. Then rinse it out very briefly. The vinegar smell will go away as your hair dries.  Or, you can also mix 2-4 T of our herbal vinegar hair rinse concentrate/refill (same product as our spray, just a different container) in a cup or applicator bottle with some water (approximately 2T to 1 cup water) and pour/squirt it over your scalp and hair after washing. The slight smell of vinegar will go away as your hair dries. The acid in the vinegar removes scaly build up and residue on the scalp and hair shaft and closes the cuticles/scales causing them to lie flat and SHINE. It also helps clean all styling products and shampoo residue out of your hair, and restores the natural pH of your scalp, preventing it from becoming dried out and itchy. (Alternatively, you can try one of our Citric Acid Rinses. They smell amazing while achieving the same results!)

Some people may still find due to the texture of their hair, or the time of the year, that they get occasionally dry hair. For this, especially in MN winters, once my hair is dry and styled, I take a very small (less than pea size) drop of either our organic jojoba oil or organic argan oil and lightly rub it into my hands. Then I gently run my hands over my hair starting from about half way down the hair shaft to the ends. I barely touch my hair with my hands, but the hair grabs the oil residue on your hands and this adds an extra level of nourishment and shine. For thermal heat protectant put 2 drops in the palm of your hand and gently massage into damp hair after showering. Your hair will feel silky soft after blow-drying. Here's a great article with the visual differences between using jojoba vs argan on hair.

I've been using these bars since 2012 and will never go back to regular shampoo again. I love how soft, silky, and manageable my hair has become and I love that I can wash my hair AND entire body with a delicious smelling, all natural bar of wonderfulness! With our large selection of shampoo/body bar combos, you will be sure to find one (or more) to fall madly in love with!