The first in a series, this post breaks down the basic anatomy of a shampoo, helping to decipher the key ingredients that comprise the shampoos that you use on a daily basis – and what you may want to think about when choosing your next one.

What’s in my shampoo?
A basic recipe or template for a shampoo most likely includes the following kinds of ingredients:

• Surfactants: Also known as surface active agents, surfactants are necessary for the lathering, cleaning and degreasing effects of a shampoo. Because of these degreasing effects, surfactants have the potential to be drying and irritating, so it can be a delicate balance to create a shampoo that cleans the hair without stripping away beneficial components. Shampoos usually contain a cocktail of surfactants, artfully combined to strike the right balance.
• Water: Along with surfactants, water is part of the basic foundation of shampoos and liquid cleansers, which are more than 50% water.
• Preservative: Preservatives, whose main function is to prevent microbial growth and to ensure shelf life, are required for the formulation of shampoos. When it comes to preservatives, none are truly benign, since the main purpose of a preservative is to prevent growth of microorganisms and keep products fresh. However, preservative systems are a necessary component of personal care products, in particular water-based ones such as shampoos.
• Active and Other Ingredients: These are the ingredients that nourish and beautify – making your hair shinier, smoother, softer, thicker and more manageable. Natural actives include herbal extract, vitamins, amino acids and proteins, and antioxidants. Other ingredients, such as thickeners, humectants, pH control agents or chelators, may be added to stabilize the formula.
• Fragrance: Along with functionality, fragrance is one of the key attributes that makes personal care products stand apart from each other, and fragrance has a very strong influence on our personal product choices.
• Color: In basic shampoos, color is added for decorative purposes only and is unnecessary for functionality.

Comparing conventional shampoos with our basic and Premium Body Care shampoos found at Whole Foods Market.

While our basic standards already set us apart from the conventionals, our top-tier Premium Body Care goes above and beyond. It took our experts more than two years to meticulously examine each and every personal care ingredient in Whole Body. Using the most current safety and efficacy data, research and resources available, they evaluated each product ingredient in four key areas-results, source, environmental impact and safety-searching for the excellence that we believe makes for a premium product. Here’s how shampoos compare:

As you can see, it can be fun to review the ingredient lists on the personal care products that you use on a regular basis in order to discover the kinds of ingredients they contain. How does your shampoo fit the recipe?

Shampoo is one of the most challenging products to make truly natural because functionality is so important for hair care products. We applaud the work of our Premium Body Care vendors, who have worked to develop natural alternatives to the most common synthetic ingredients found in shampoos. It is possible to make many good improvements in the area of natural shampoos, as can be seen by the blossoming numbers of Premium shampoos on our shelves, including those from Depth, Ikove, Alaffia, John Masters Organics and Aubrey Organics.

There are differences in how essentials oils are distilled, and when they are extracted artfully with hydrodistillation methods, according to Jack, you are going to get a full spectrum of fragrance components that cannot be achieved with CO2 and steam-extracted essential oils and absolutes. Jack calls these minor fragrance constituents of the plant “soul components” — components that transfer the plant’s intelligence and the intact life force. It is due to these soul components that natural fragrances are so complex, that the scent keeps changing as you smell it. When you breathe it in, it is like being in nature or like smelling the ocean. Through this poetic vision of essential oil extraction, distillation is seen as the art of releasing the plant’s soul into the oils.

Jack says it is easy to understand essential oil extraction when you consider the parallel to food processing. For example, olive oil can be extracted with a hexane solvent (which is not allowed at Whole Foods Market for stand alone oil) or it can be expeller pressed, and the same is true for essential oils. Fragrance, when extracted properly, is alive and can be compared to the highest quality olive oil.

Jack’s foundation for learning about natural fragrances was a natural silk dyeing business that he owned years ago. Through the dyeing process, Jack noticed that the natural colors had a smell, which planted the seeds for Jack’s current business, Scents of Knowing.

When Jack decided to start extracting his own essential oils for Scents of Knowing, he designed his own equipment. Jack only distills in pure glass (in ancient times, it would have been ceramic) and only uses live flame. He uses the ancient principles of hydrodistillation for crafting his oils, where plant materials are extracted in water, gently heated over the course of hours, and then cooled so that the plant will release itself.

Extraction can be an art, and the extraction process is a little different for each plant material. Flowers, for example, contain a high wax content, so in Jack’s process, he uses 100% natural jojoba wax to extract the flower oils. And frankincense undergoes 13 different temperature changes over the process of its distillation. Jack describes this process as peeling the layers of an onion. The end result is that Jack’s oils are “in tune” — telling the whole story of the plant.

Jack likes to point out that there is a connection between how we smell and how we feel. This is why some traditional Chinese medicine doctors diagnose by smell. In this vein, Jack has observed many people smelling through the fragrance guides that he conducts (similar to a wine tasting), and it gives him much joy to train people and attune them to natural, harmonic scents. Often times, people are only used to smelling synthetic fragrances, so that they need to “re-train” their nose to recognize and appreciate natural fragrances. As Jack likes to say, listen to the smell, the natural plant fragrances are trying to tell you something. Even after all these years, Jack claims he is still learning to listen.

One of the most challenging areas for us to research has been fragrances, primarily because there is no official definition in place for natural when it comes to fragrances. Furthermore, the testing and verification of fragrances is quite complex, which has made it difficult for us to determine if a fragrance in a product is 100% natural or not. To help us better understand these issues, we decided that we needed to see the process of distilling 100% natural fragrances (essential oils) firsthand.

Memorable among this experience was the beautiful opportunity this summer to witness the rose harvest and the subsequent distilling of rose essential oil. As the days start to bring a chill in the air, my mind wanders to the misty field in Bulgaria where Rosa damascena plants grow seemingly to the horizon. It is early morning because the peak hours for rose picking are from 5am to 10am when the plant oils are strongest. There is a noticeable scent of rose in the air, and workers — many with blossoms in their hair — are scattered throughout the field with huge sacks of pale pink flowers. We attempt to help with the harvest, and quickly realize that we must develop the skill for grasping the blossom at the precise place and pulling with the right force to collect the delicate flowers. We are painfully slow novices, although our hands become faintly scented with rose and we are happy (as it seems are the other workers) to be in that field, on that morning.

At the manufacturing facility, this morning’s harvest, all 60,000 kg of it, is strewn in sacks surrounding the copper distilleries. Unbelievably, it takes 3000-4000 kg of rose blossoms to make 1 kg of rose oil. This year, conditions are dry, so the yield will be lower. Although the steam distillers run 24/7 during the harvest season, the oil is released only once a day. In what seems to be a special daily ritual, we are allowed access to the locked room where we get to see the release of the gallon or so of rose oil that day, a magical event akin to uncorking a special bottle of wine.

At the end of it all, here is what I am most struck with:

• Wonder, gratitude and respect for how hard people work to produce the products and ingredients on our shelves.
• Awe over the immense amount of flowers needed to make a small bit of essential oil. This, and all other essential oils, are concentrated plant essences, to be used wisely.
• Visible realization that if everything in the process is carefully tended to—from field to manufacture to storage—the end result will be a high quality product. This tenet could be applied to all kinds of products, in body care products and throughout the store.

As we continue work with Premium Body Care—we recently hit the mark of having approved over 2300 products that meet Premium Body Care—we hope to be able to offer a greater selection of products that are filled with such high quality ingredients, including natural fragrances.

Jody talks to us about the specifics of Superfoods, she will tell us about certain Superfoods and their makeup, where you can find them and tips on how to get more into your diet.