Part II: Natural Deodorants

After poring over lots and lots of DIY recipes for natural homemade deodorant, I finally settled upon 6 formulas that included most of the ingredients I had read about as options.  Most had baking soda and arrowroot powder, but not all.  One had castor oil; one had aloe vera gel; Several had beeswax.  I was particularly curious to see if beeswax made a positive, "can't live without" contribution, or if it would simply make the deodorant too hard to apply.  I also wanted to determine if baking soda was absolutely essential to absorb odors or not. I, too, wondered if coconut oil found in so many recipes was the main contributing factor to stains in clothing. I made 6 samples that were suitable to fill a regular deodorant tube.  Since I didn't have that many empty tubes on hand, I decided to use lip balm tubes instead.  They wouldn't provide the surface area needing for regular use, but could do a good job of testing application and melting point.




The lineup of ingredients for each Test Group was as follows:

To determine which, if any of the recipes could compete with store-bought natural deodorants, I conducted 5 separate tests.
1. Texture Test.  (How gritty or smooth it felt to the touch.)  smooth (1)-gritty (5)
2.  Ease of Application. I rated how smoothly it could be applied using a deodorant tube (1 being
                                      easiest and  5 being most difficult)
3.  The Stain Test.  I applied each sample to a piece of cotton fabric to check for oily residue.
4.  Heat Friendliness Test.I placed them all in a 125 degree oven to see how long they could hold out on a hot summer day.
5.  Duration Test-- How long it would last until I needed to reapply.  Deodorants do not prevent sweating, but they help kill bacteria and keep you from stinking it up.

Results:

Texture
With regards to texture, , A and B did not make the cut.  The gritty baking soda was quite evident in both of these samples.   The winner in this category hands-down was sample D, but that is not surprising since it contains no baking soda at all.  Test Groups C, E, and F, all shared a similar texture.  It was mostly smooth with an ever-so-slight touch of grittiness.  The texture did not bother me at all; I would be fine with any of these 4 deodorants when it comes to texture.

Ease of Application
 With 1 being slick and easy to apply and 5 being either too soft, runny, or hard to apply, Test Groups C and D tied for first place.  I ended up rating them both a "2" because neither is as perfect as those propylene glycol deodorants found in the stores, but they both applied really well.  As might be expected, A and B fell short in this department again.  Test Group A left a considerable powdery residue on application.  And B, never solidified so it sort of disqualified itself from the start.  I do want to point out, that some folks intentionally make liquid deodorants either to use in spray form or because they believe in the liquid components such as aloe vera or witch hazel. I knew from the start this one wasn't going to harden, but thought it would make a nice comparison.  That leaves Test Group E.  Let's just say, with its generous portion of beeswax, it is difficult to apply easily.

Stain Test.
Test Groups E and F ranked best in this category leaving barely noticeable stains.  Test Groups, B,C, and D, fared the worst.  All of these samples left oily patches on the fabric.  I'm still uncertain of the correlation with coconut oil.  While all 3 of the formulas that left really noticeable stains contain coconut oil, 2 of the groups that did not leave significant stains, also had coconut oil. Perhaps more than one factor is involved here. After washing the cotton fabric, no stains were detected, but more tests may need to be done to determine staining on costlier fabrics like silk.

Warm Day Friendliness Test
I wasn't sure how to do this one.  I really wanted it to be a 100 degree day so I could carry my samples around with me in a steaming hot car in my purse.  After all, that is why I was doing this test in the first place. I settled upon  turning the oven on the warm  setting and checking the samples and temperature every few minutes to keep track of how they were holding up.  I didn't bother with B since it started out in liquid form.  Test Group A soon followed suit and softened up after only about 3-4 minutes.  Test Group C softened up next, but it took it over 5 minutes at 125 degrees and it was by no means melted, just softening up.  D and F did really well, both of them maintaining their firm state up to 15 minutes after being exposed to 125 degrees.  They did finally begin to soften at the 30 minute mark.  And no surprises here, Test Group E with the largest amount of beeswax, was still going strong even after 30 minutes.  

Duration Test
By the time I was ready to test out how long these samples would last until needing to be reapplied, I had already narrowed down the field to 3 finalists.  One of them did not contain baking soda, and the other 2 were fairly similar except for the type of butter they contained.  I chose to test C and D for an entire day.  I really wanted to see what this stuff could do, so I started out by taking a 3 mile run.  I sweated some, but there was absolutely no body odor.  I checked throughout the day and 9 hours later, I was still doing fine but was beginning to detect a bit more perspiration.  Both test groups  (with and without the baking soda) seemed to work equally well.  I intend to give this a longer trial before drawing any hard conclusions, but preliminary results seem to show that baking soda is not absolutely necessary to make an effective deodorant.

 CONCLUSION

My overall favorite natural deodorant was Test Group D.

All the butters and oils measured and ready

It had by far the smoothest texture, best glide for application, great reliability in hot weather, and it worked for over 9 hours including physical activity before reapplication was necessary. And while, it didn't win the "stain" test, that is not a "make it or break it" factor for me. Runner-Up goes to Test Group C. My husband actually preferred this one when it came to texture and glide. It fared almost as well as D, but did not hold up quite as well in the heat and had a slightly more gritty texture. Still, it performed superbly and worked all day. Tomorrow, I will post the formulas for my favorite natural deodorant as well as the runner-up. I have a few more general observations about using natural deodorants and how you can individualize the formulas to cater to your specific needs.