Creating your own lip balm. It’s like making your own sourdough or growing your own herbs. It feels more satisfying than just picking them up at Ralph’s.
When I first was creating Plant Pucker, deciding how I wanted to manufacture the product was priority number one. I knew I wanted it to be all-natural and eco-friendly. My biggest concern was buying plastic tubes. I began to brainstorm how I could have a lip balm company that was affordable, convenient, and sustainable. As the saying goes, if you want something done right, do it yourself. I scoured the internet for vegan lip balm recipes (as many contain beeswax and/or lanolin) and combined my research to make my own. I purchased a bunch of small black tins to store the lip balms in.
I loved the final product. It was smooth, smelled great, easy to make, and, with the black tins, plastic-free. The problem is, I like to apply lip balm liberally. And on the go. It wasn’t practical for me to wash my hands, apply the lip balm, and then wash my hands again so my finger wasn’t greasy. If my goal was to make a product convenient and an easy vegan alternative to traditional lip balm (i.e Chapstick and Burt’s Bees), I had to come up with a new plan. Fast forward a few months and I found a manufacturer that was aligned with what I wanted to achieve.
However, if you feel inclined to make your own lip balm, I encourage you! It’s a satisfying process and you know exactly what’s going into it. Plant Pucker is made with a small number of all-natural ingredients. It’s perfect for those who don’t want to, or cannot, make their own lip balm but don’t want to worry about sketchy ingredients.
I present to you, the recipe I used to make a vegan lip balm I loved. You can pour it into refillable tins or even reuse your Plant Pucker tubes.
Ingredients:
- 1 ½ tbsp candelilla wax
- 2 tbsp of shea butter (can sub cocoa butter)
- 1 tbsp coconut oil
- 1 tbsp jojoba oil
- About 6 drops of vitamin E
- A few drops of therapeutic grade essential oils.
- My favorites are peppermint and vanilla. This one is up to you! If you want it super scented/flavored, you can do 15 drops. If you want a hint, you can do 3 drops. It's truly up to you.
That’s it! It’s super easy and fun to make. You can also get creative with the ingredients! Maybe you don’t like coconut oil and want to use just jojoba. Or jojoba and almond oil. You can do all sorts of scents like patchouli, lavender, etc. Please make sure your skin can tolerate it first!
For melting the ingredients, you can use a double boiler or make your own. You can put a glass bowl on top of a boiling pot of water, much like you would do to melt chocolate. I found it easiest to put a glass measuring cup in a pan of water.
Steps:
- Set up your double boiler and turn your burner on to low-medium heat.
- As your water is heating up, add 1 1/2 tbsp candelilla wax, 2 tbsp shea butter, 1 tbsp coconut oil, and 1 tbsp jojoba oil to the dish.
- Allow the ingredients to melt completely, stirring with a heat resistant utensil. I recommend a rubber spatula. When it’s fully melted, it’ll be similar to the color and texture of movie theater “butter”.
- Remove the mixture from heat (or turn off the stove) and stir in the Vitamin E and essential oils. Once mixed well, quickly pour the mixture into the container of your choice.
- Quickly is the operative word as the mixture will begin to cool and harden almost immediately after removing it from heat.
- Rinse whatever you used for the boiler!
- Like I said, the mixture will begin to harden. Although the ingredients are all natural, you don’t want to be stuck with a waxy dish. Wash as soon as you’ve poured the mixture into the tins. This recipe is enough to fill about 3, 0.5 oz tins. I used these, but again, use whatever you prefer. If you have something you can reuse, that’s even better.
- Allow the mixture to cool and voila! Your own lip balm that’ll last you quite a long time. Amazon also sells the plastic tubes and kits to fill them if that’s easier.
Let me know how you like the recipe! If you’ve added some changes, feel free to help others out in the comments.