Testing Shampoo Bars: The $6 Bar

Today at the Squiggly Sudsery, we decided to test shampoo bars.

And by we, I mean me.

Hello! I am the only employee here at the Sudsery—the owner, maker, blog writer, you name it. It’s me.

I’ve gotten requests to make shampoo bars, so here I am!

I’ve been testing cold process shampoo bars, but as you can imagine, they take a little too long between tests, with all that curing time and whatnot. Well, I wanted to be able to test things a little faster, so I decided to go a different route.

Enter: the surfactant shampoo bar.

Surfactants are the sudsy stuff that isn’t quite soap. For today’s test, I used SLSa, the same ingredient we use in our bath bombs (like our Paw Bath Bombs), along with glutinous rice flour, Bubble Up, distilled water, MCT, preservative, and fragrance.

And bam! We had a shampoo bar.

Woah, woah, woah! Hold on. What was that? Oh, yes, I did just throw in a bunch of ingredients like we’re in chemistry class.

Don’t worry, I’ve got you covered!

What is Bubble Up?

Bubble Up is made up of cocamidopropyl betaine, another sudsy ingredient that helps give us those big bubbles!

Get it?

Bubbles go up.

Bubble Up.

Haha!

Now on to the next ingredient!

What is MCT?

Stands for medium-chain triglycerides. It’s usually derived from coconut and/or palm oil and can give products a smooth, silky feel.

Why did I choose this oil?

Well…why not?

I wasn’t really testing the oil yet. I just wanted to use an oil I already had on hand and needed to use up, and MCT oil fit the bill.

What about the fragrance?

Why did I write fragrance, you may ask?

Well, honestly, the fragrance is not the important bit for this test. I chose a pine scent—hence the green bar.

Did I mention I added color?

No?

Well, I did!

Green.

Onto the shampoo bar...

So we made our shampoo bar, and it felt like clay. Honestly, it was kind of fun to play with.

I tried putting it into a mold shaped like a steamed bun.

Fail.

That’s okay. I just shaped it into my own bar. We don’t need it to be pretty.

(That’s what I tell myself, anyway.)

And actually, it looks fantastic. Job well done! I was already thinking about the next test.

We were going to be using rice starch instead of rice flour, but…well, as I entered my formula into my calculator that records my batches- I noticed something. I decided I was no longer going to pursue this particular bar.

Why, you may ask?

Well, the short answer is: it’s expensive.

The long answer?

There is no long answer.

It’s EXPENSIVE.

Yikes.

How expensive, you may ask?

$6.05 per bar.

You heard that correctly.

Six dollars and five cents. PER BAR.

And this isn’t even a giant shampoo bar. It’s an itty-bitty little bar that costs me $6.05 just to make.

This bar better be magical.

It better last for months.

Because at this price point, it needs to.

I’m still going to test this one to see how long it lasts and, more importantly, how my hair feels after using it. I want to know what I can actually get out of this little $6 bar before I completely write it off.

But unless this thing turns out to be something truly special, I think we’re going to pass on this formula.

I now know better than to blindly follow recipes without checking how much they cost to make. Besides, sometimes product testing isn't about finding the next product to add to the shop.

It’s about finding out what not to make.

And apparently, today we spent $6.05 to learn that lesson.