Scents. Many companies are also
expanding their offerings of organic
essential oils and proprietary fragrances that meet NOP standards.
Taking the science of perfumery to
the organic and natural realm, suppliers have created certified organic isolates. Jack Corley of Trillogy asserts
that these are as important as organic
essential oils in perfumery.
“It is difficult for a perfumer to
‘balance’ a fragrance using only organic essential oils. For example, ingredients like organic geraniol (from
organic palmarosa) and organic terpi-neol- 4 (from organic eucalyptus)
when combined with organic essential
oils help a perfumer balance the fragrance notes and smooth out any medicinal or crude notes,” Corley says.
These sorts of ingredient advancements afford the organic personal
care industry the opportunity to take
fragrances to ever more sophisticated
levels.
Functional Ingredients. There are
also several new products that help
improve functionality of organic personal care. One of these ingredients
now available is organic lecithin, a natural emulsifier. While lecithin is most
widely used in the manufacturing of
chocolate, it also provides stability to
many personal care products, as well
as glide and sheen. To create an organic version, Clarkson Grain developed a mechanical extraction system
that precludes the need for chemical
(hexane) extraction which is utilized
in conventional lecithin. Although
lecithin is traditionally made from soy,
the company also offers a canola-de-rived lecithin for those with specific allergy concerns related to soy. Clarkson
also has a lecithin made specifically
for applications that require low microbial levels.
Emulsifiers are needed to bring
water and oil together in many types
of products, but until recently most
organic emulsifiers were either on the
low end (around 4) or the high end
(around 16) of the Hydrophile Lipophile Balance (HLB) scale, leading
to products that lacked body. Earth Supplied Products (ESP) now of-
fers a SafeEmuls line, which has HLB ratings that are in the middle
(around 8). SafeEmuls are all primary emulsifiers and work well with
rice bran and soy lecithin as secondary emulsifiers.
