
Home Spa Bath Salts with Essential Oil
If you're reading this, you're probably already an essential oil lover. Even though you are creating yummy skin care products, using oils on your family, and blending recipes, you're urged by many experts, friends, and family to ask about purity, quality, and standards. These are all important questions to ask when you immerse yourself into the world of Aromatherapy.
Why Choose The Herb Stop for Essential Oils?
Pure Rose Essential Oil from Turkey
The Herb Stop was one of the first purveyors of essential oils in Arizona. We have been visiting distilleries all over the world including Europe and the Middle East, deeply immersing ourselves into the aromatherapy scene, teaching aromatherapy classes and providing the highest quality of essential oils since 1992.
Our founder, Leilah, and her late husband, Dr. John Hajdu, Oral Surgeon and Certified Aromatherapist, spent the formative years of our business seeking distilleries with high standards as well as traditional old world practices. During that time, they established many relationships with farmers, distilleries as well as the companies that represent them. We have cultivated these connections since 1992. Whew! That's a long time!
Dr. Hajdu's daughter, Natalie Hajdu-Voakes, was fortunate enough to learn the art and science of aromatherapy and the techniques of finding high quality essential oils, as well as the skills to continue these relationships, from her father.
Since his passing, she has continued to develop her scientific and practical knowledge of essential oils, receiving certifications in essential oil chemistry as well as essential oil safety. However, if you ask her, she will tell you that her greatest education has come from the many customers she has worked with since 1995. This continuing education has ensured that The Herb Stop can provide you with the highest quality of essential oils.
The Herb Stop Believes in Transparency
Organoleptic Testing Essential Oils
How do you know if an essential oil is pure and unadulterated? Well, we use several methods.
The first is the use of our senses, known as organoleptic testing. This means we have used our sense of sight to determine color, clarity, and viscosity. We also use our sense of smell to confirm that the scent is characteristic of the plant's essential oil. Occasionally, the sense of touch is also applied - as in the case of peppermint. We take our testing a step further by therapeutically testing the essential oil to confirm it's health benefits.
Following the testing through our senses, we use science to verify the purity and quality of each essential oil. We obtain gas chromatography/mass spectrometry, as well as certificates of analysis on every essential oil. In our commitment to transparency, we publish all of these essential documents on our website for the vast array of essential oils we offer. This identifies the percentage of each individual chemical component - an amazing way to verify purity!
Sample of GC/MS of Essential Oil Sample of Certificate of Analysis of Essential Oil
To make sure all of our oils are fresh and potent, we store them in proper temperature conditions - between 60 and 70 degrees Fahrenheit. We visually ensure each bottle has the minimum amount of oxygen present. Each essential oil is stored in dark bottles protected from the light in dark cabinets. Can you imagine how exquisite the wave of aroma is every time these precious cabinets are opened?
In addition to our standards, each essential oil purchased from The Herb Stop is hand filled - no automated machines here!
Keeping with our promise of transparency, we also disclose the date of manufacture and keep track of this using lot numbers.
The Herb Stop Believes in Safety!
As you have probably discovered during trial and error, essential oils are really quite powerful. They can be wonderful healing tools when used appropriately, but they may also cause some concern. Certain essential oils can cause photosensitivity, interfere with medication, even burn the skin. This is why we have chosen to comply with international aromatherapy standards; therefore, we do not advise the internal use of essential oils without the approval of a qualified healthcare practitioner skilled in the oral use of essential oils. This protects you and your family.
If you plan on using essential oils in cooking, drinks, elixirs, or other fun goodies, on our website we state if an essential oil is FCC (food chemical codex). This means the FDA has stated that a particular essential oil is safe for food and flavor use.
Does that mean it is food grade? This can be a tricky question. Food grade in fact means that the essential oil was further refined to remove certain constituents that would have made the essential oil less palatable. For example, food grade peppermint is sweeter because the constituent that adds bitterness to the oil has been removed. While this will make your holiday candies yummy, it is actually less therapeutic.
We love using the proper term for high quality and pure essential oils - unadulterated. This means the essential oil has come from the farm, to the distiller and into our hands without any intervention or adulteration. This maintains the highest of standards. Unadulterated is a more descriptive and promising term than "therapeutic" grade.
By sharing our standards, procedures and techniques with you, you can feel confident and assured that we have searched high and low to bring you the most amazing unadulterated essential oils from around the globe.
We look forward to sharing our magnificent essential oil selection with you!
Shop The Herb Stop's wide selection of pure and unadulterated essential oils today.