#making cosmetics

Applied Teaching. My Business Journey.

Hello readers,

It’s a rainy day here in the Blue Mountains and I’m at the end of a week that has been quite remarkable for me, remarkable in a simple, invisible-to-others way.  This week I’ve felt the earth shift a little as I work through my relationship with my business. I’m telling you this knowing that some of you read this just so you can copy me or to “be me but better”. I know that there…

Can you give me your opinion on…

2019 didn’t feel like a good year to be a scientist for many reasons but it is the rise in people asking questions prefaced by the above that has niggled me more than it probably should.

Opinions are not facts.

Fish are friends not food.

And anything else that springs to my mind 🙂

What’s I’m saying here is that my raw opinion doesn’t necessarily stand for anything when it comes to how your brand…

That ever elusive ingredient. Why you can’t always get what you want (or need)….

OK so I’m writing this in Australia but I’ve also lived and worked in Europe.  The markets and access issues are different in both places and I’m sure they are different again across the other continents.

I have been working on a formula and, as sometimes happens, I’ve hit upon a problem.  I won’t tell you exactly what the problem is (it’s to do with boosting the performance of this product) as…

So Sodium Benzoate is going to kill us but Benzoic Acid is ok……….

So Sodium Benzoate is produced by reacting Benzoic Acid with Sodium Hydroxide to form the Sodium  SALT of the Benzoic Acid.  It makes no sense for the Natural News article (September 2011) to claim that Benzoic Acid is OK as it appears in fruits in low levels but Sodium Benzoate is bad because it is man made because when used in a formulation Sodium Benzoate actually becomes Benzoic Acid and…

Time away to get over myself and get moving towards the positive :)

I don’t like to keep banging on about my personal (business) issues here on the blog as I’m sure that many people just come to read about chemistry and stuff but for those of you with a business or who follow me because I am working with you as a consultant I feel it is good to for me to be open and honest about my professional journey.  That is because it is all too easy to see the happy, happy,…

Ever wondered why we are called Realize Beauty? Probably not but I’ll tell you anyway :)

My company name is Selling Science.  It is a name that I enthusiastically registered just before leaving my corporate job as I was sure that Selling Science was EXACTLY what I would be spending my time doing in my new life as a consultant.  I thought that everyone would want to hire me to create marketing material for them, to balance out the junk that the internet spews out about certain…

The Beauty Of Chelating Agents – Cosmetic Formulating 101

Did you ever play with these as a child?

Those are stickle bricks or bristle blocks if you are from the USA.

They are also the closest thing in terms of free and easily relatable visual teaching aid that I can find to help communicate the power of the chelating agent.

If you are looking for a quick-fix definition and that’s all here it is. Chelating agents bind up trace metal ion contaminants in…

Is adding Aloe Vera into a formula worth the risk?

If you look carefully on the beauty aisle shelves you will find Aloe Barbadensis on the INCI listing of what seems to be every skincare product you get your hands on. This is largely due to the rise of the Certified Organic market. The fact that Aloe can be grown organically then powdered into granules ready for re-constituting in your formulation water thus giving you an instant 70-85% organic…