How We Formulate our Products

The process of formulation always starts with a problem to be solved. I don't believe in creating products just for the sake of having something new or to follow a trend, that is the domain of big brands trying to maintain their slice of the market and those whose aspirations are for speedy growth often with investors snapping at their heels.

We don't have investors so that pressure is fortunately absent and with our de-growth, sufficiency ethos we can introduce new products as and when we feel the need. With that in mind, as my work is a fine balance of therapeutics, skincare and wellbeing, there is plenty of scope for development.

For the last year I've been concerned with sleep. So many people contact me with sleep issues - some can fall asleep but wake up at 3am unable to drift off again, some can't get to sleep, some feel intense anxiety about their insomnia in the lead up to going to bed which disrupts almost every night.

For many women, the peri-menopause and menopause are massively disrupting to sleep - anxiety levels peak, often in the middle of the night, exacerbated by hot flushes. It feels truly awful, night after night and leads to feelings of exhaustion, loss of confidence and brain fog. 

But sleep issues can affect anyone at any time - high levels of continuing stress unbalance the hormones creating a near permanent state of fight or flight. This massively affects sleep. So I decided to make something to help.

The first part of the process of formulating is to read - a lot. I use clinical journals, I read academic papers, I refer to the herbal and homeopathic books in my extensive library. I talk to people about their experience of sleeplessness and in this case I also had a look at what else was on the market, not to copy it, but to work out the limitations of what was already available and see if I could bring something more effective to the problem.

This process of researching sleep issues was really interesting because there is a huge amount of material available to scrutinise and a vast array of products already available on the market, from powders to capsules, tinctures to teas, balms to lotions. After several months of reading and musing, I decided that I definitely had something extra to bring to the party.

For us there is also a second strand to development which makes the period from idea to product particularly long, because so many of our products require plants that we grow or wild harvest. At the testing stage I sometimes source plants that are organically grown by another trusted supplier just to decide whether they work and in what concentration, then I can work out if we can grow them and in what quantity. For the sleep cream, Hops and Chamomile are essential ingredients.

At the same time as working on the sleep, I was thinking about hair products because a lot of women have asked about an effective natural shampoo and conditioner so I began the same process thinking about how to protect, encourage new growth and add shine without using a detergent, a swathe of synthetics and some pretty horrid chemicals and how to make them in bar form to totally eliminate plastic packaging.

Beyond sleep and hair, there's the Bump & Bash Balm which has been swirling round my head for years, and I have commission work - in this instance a trio of non alcoholic drinks to invite acceptance and instil feelings of embrace and love. Also a product range inspired by two ingredients, Heather and Seaweed for another client. 

Having put in all the work on what I want to achieve in terms of results, be it therapeutics, taste or action, I start to formulate and test bringing together the plants i need. This part is really challenging because I have to work out how to extract what I'm wanting from each plant I work with - it might be through distillation, maceration in alcohol, water or oil, enfleurage or some other process. It might need several steps, macerating then grinding, heating, cooling, straining, pressing, pasteurising or whatever. To do this well takes a lot of time and an understanding of whether the compound I'm wanting is soluble in oil, water or alcohol.

I often see people making claims for a product that I know can't work because the key ingredient they're shouting about is not soluble in any of the ingredients they've declared. The other two big mistakes I see are in the plants themselves - sometimes it's the right plant but wrong variety, sometimes the 'hero' plant is the last ingredient on the label meaning that the amount used in the formulation is so negligible that the product is more about marketing than action.

After months of prep, I create a working recipe. For sleep I realised it needed to be a 2 phase product to cover everything I wanted to achieve, one part is to drink and one part is to apply to the skin. The skin part is a cream. Recipe 1 was an abject failure, it split immediately, recipes 2-4 also failed on consistency. It has to feel good to apply. Recipe 5 showed a bit of promise but it wasn't good enough, so I stopped, went back over each recipe and test and worked out how to resolve the issues. To fail is to learn and I welcome that. It's part of perfecting a process and developing a really good product. For me, good enough doesn't cut it. Every product has to be the very best I can make it.

This week is formulation test week, it's a week of doing nothing but recipe testing over and over again, tweaking and checking. By the end of this week, the sleep cream will be perfected and we'll be preparing to send it out to those of you who have volunteered as testers. We're very excited about that. The drink part is also almost there so I'll be sending that out with the cream too. If you've volunteered, Alexander will be in touch for your addresses and we plan to get it to you around Valentine's Day. If you'd like to volunteer, email me at hello@asapoth.com and I'll add you to the list.

The Shampoo and Conditioner have turned out excellently well and will be stored and tested over the next few months. The shampoo bars need at least 6 weeks to cure. The Bump & Bash Balm is almost formulated, I'm just waiting for the anti-inflammatory Turmeric I grated up yesterday to sit in oil for a few weeks to complete that product, the remainder of it works like a dream and the Turmeric roots I planted in the greenhouse are looking very happy. 

I'm making the drinks today having started the process yesterday so am looking forward to feeling wonderfully calm and happy by the end of the day - testing everything on myself is one of the joys of the job.

The very best part of making these products is the knowledge that a good product really does make a difference to how you look, how you feel about yourself and how healthy you are, it's such a privilege to be able to do this work. Long may it continue.