Introduction
Who doesn’t love a creamy decadent body butter? I know personally I love them. Body butters are usually anhydrous products comprised of butters and oils. They are super fun and easy to make but there’s one big problem that comes up every year particularly when we get to our hot summer months - they melt. In this blog we are going to address some of the precautions you can take to stop your body butters from melting.
1. Use butters with high melting points
It may sound obvious but the reason body butters melt is because the environmental temperature has exceeded the melting point of the butter. Solid butters in most cases are what gives the body butter its shape and body. If you were to try and make a body butter using only liquid oils it wouldn’t work, the solid butters is what gives it the the butter cream consistency. With that being said, ones of the ways to prevent the body butter from melting is to use solid butters with high melting points.
Cocoa butter has a melting point of 33-34 °C (Syafira et al, 2021).
Shea butter has a melting point of 34-38 °C (Oseni, 2019)
Kokum butter has a melting point of 32-40 °C (Chemistry Connection, 2020)
Coconut oil has a melting of around 20 °C (Harvard, 2024)
Based on these melting points we can conclude that cocoa butter, shea butter and kokum butter have higher melting points that coconut oil. Based on this information we may choose to increase the percentage of the higher melting point butters and decrease the amount of liquid carrier oils and coconut oil. From this we can see that shea butter has the highest melting point from the options listed, one option therefore could be to make a body butter using mostly shea butter.
The summer formula may look something like:
70% Shea Butter
28.5% Coconut Oil
1% Vitamin E Oil
0.5% Essential Oil
This may mean having two separate formulas one especially for winter use where the colder temperatures will call for more liquid oils in the formula and a lesser percentage of higher melting point butters. And in the summer do the opposite, use higher percentages of high melting point butters and less liquid oils in the formula.
The winter formula may look something like:
60% Shea Butter
20% Almond Oil
18.5% Grapeseed Oil
1% Vitamin E Oil
0.5% Essential Oil
2. Make an emulsion
Have you noticed how on the back of the ingredient labels of many commercial body butters the first ingredient listed is water. There are a couple reasons brands do this and one of them is for stability purposes. Big brands ship their products all over the world from cold climates like Canada and Norway to warmer climates such as Spain and the Caribbean Islands, to ensure their products do not melt or have other adverse effects due to differing climates they make emulsions. Emulsions do not / cannot melt, just to clarify an emulsion is when water and oil are mixed together to form a cream or lotion.
There is however a caveat to this solution, many people do not believe an authentic body butter should contain water, and as a result do not support brands that put water in their body butters. To be clear you can put water in your body butters and it would still be a body butter and it would be perfect legal for you to market it as such. Another benefit to doing so is that emulsions penetrate into the skin much better than anhydrous body butters do, which usually sit on top of the skin and as a result not provide the moisturising benefits needed. There is also a cost element water is cheaper than oils and butters and this is another reason big brands create emulsions instead of anhydrous body butters.
Further drawbacks include the need of using a preservative, increased risk of contamination resulting in the need for more steps and precautions in the manufacturing process. Another drawback is the reduction in the nutrients and benefits provided by the butters and oils due to the product being watered down.
Whilst making an emulsion can be a great way to prevent your body butters from melting there are pros and cons to consider. It is important you make an informed decision before choosing whether you want to create an anhydrous body butter or an emulsified body butter.
3. Stearic Acid & Cetearyl Alcohol
Stearic acid is a fatty acid and commonly used in shaving cream and bath products due its stabilising properties and to build the body of the product; in its pure form has a melting point of 69-71 °C (Zhen, 2015). Stearic acid has a very high melting point, it is actually what gives shea butter and cocoa butter their solid form as they are both high in stearic acid. It is soluble in oil therefore could be a good option to prevent your body butter form melting. Try adding it in at 5% it is safe for use in moisturisers up to 7% but generally is used at around 1 - 5% in moisturisers including moisturisers made for babies (Cosmetic Ingredient Review, 2005). Add during the heat phase - when your butters are melting add the stearic acid and continuously mix until fully dissolved.
Cetearyl alcohol could be another good option, it is a fatty alcohol commonly used in as a co emulsifier and stabiliser. It is naturally derived and made from either palm or coconut oil. It is soluble in oil, and has a high melting point of 50 - 54 °C (Biorigins, 2022). Try adding it to your formula at 5% adding it during the heat phase when melting down your butters. It is typically used between 5 - 15% in cosmetic formulations, whilst it safe for use up to 25% I wouldn’t recommend using more than 10% in a body butter (Cosmetic Ingredient Review, 2006).
4. None of the above
Another option is to simply explain to your customers due to the natural butters and oils used there is a risk of melting under certain temperatures. Whilst its not ideal you’ll find a lot of your customers will be more than okay with so long as they are forewarned. The fact that it does melt indicates to the customer the naturalness of the product and can ultimately be a positive thing. If you are at market stalls you could try storing your products in a cooler. It is worth noting once a whipped body butter has melted it It will not be the same once it re-solidifies.
Conclusion
In this blog post we have had a look at a few options to stop your body butters from melting under high temperatures. We looked at the most common butters used in body butter formulations and their melting points. We looked at how to alter butter and oil percentages according to the summer and winter season. We looked at making emulsions its pros and cons and how this is the option chosen by most of the big brands. We looked at using cetearyl alcohol and stearic acid to stabilise the body butters and increase their melting points. And finally we also looked at how doing nothing and explaining the phenomenon of melting body butters to be an example of their naturalness rather than a drawback and how certain customers would be happy with this. I hope this blog provided some clarity on the issue of melting body butters and gave you some ideas on how to handle it.
References
Biorigins. (2022). Cetearyl Alcohol - Certificate of Analysis. Date Accessed [29/01/2024]. Available at: https://www.madarcorporation.com/spec-sheets/cosmetic-waxes/cetearyl-alcohol-wax/Cetearyl%20Alcohol%20-%204360514.pdf
Chemistry Connection. (2020). Kokum Butter Safety Data Sheet. Date Accessed [29/01/2024]. Available at: https://chemistryconnection.com/sds/data/pdf/Kokum_Butter_SDS_CC.pdf
Cosmetic Ingredient Review. (2005). Annual Review of Cosmetic Ingredient Safety Assessments. Date Accessed [29/01/2024]. Available at: https://online.personalcarecouncil.org/ctfa-static/online/lists/cir-pdfs/PRNS513.pdf
Cosmetic Ingredient Review. (2006). Annual Review of Cosmetic Ingredient Safety Assessments. Date Accessed [29/01/2024]. Available at: https://online.personalcarecouncil.org/ctfa-static/online/lists/cir-pdfs/PRNS547.pdf
Harvard T.H. Chan. (2024). Coconut Oil. Date Accessed [29/01/2024]. Available at: https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/nutritionsource/food-features/coconut-oil/#:~:text=Coconut%20oil%20has%20a%20melting,higher%20percentage%20of%20fat%20solids.
N.S Syafira et al. (2021). Impact of Cocoa Butter Replacer (CBR) proportion on the physical characteristics of compound dark chocolate. Date Accessed [29/01/2024]. Available at: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1755-1315/653/1/012035/pdf
Nurah Tijani Oseni. (2019). Effect of Tempering, Cooling and Stirring on the Rheological Properties of Shea butter. Date Accessed [29/01/2024]. Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332407615_Effect_of_Tempering_Cooling_and_Stirring_on_the_Rheological_Properties_of_Shea_butter
Z. When. (2015). Micro-manufacturing Engineering and Technology (Second Edition). Date Accessed [29/01/2024]. Available at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/chemical-engineering/stearic-acid#:~:text=Stearic%20acid%20(C18H36O2)%20supplied%20by,the%20paraffin%20wax%2Dbased%20slurry.
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