Shampoo Bars - Five years, a lot more hair and three lockdowns in!

For every Cosy Cottage product launched, there are many who fall by the wayside; experiments consigned to the ‘family use only’ box, at Green Man Barns, until one of the team bestows a permanent home: or doesn’t. The trials of ante-launch at the hands of family, colleagues, neighbours, friends (and only thereafter volunteers and pets) are harrowing and many energetically-conceived products fail at an early fence.

Our shampoo bars started their journey in 2016; the same year as the UK started a journey to leave the EU. With a vote of 52%, the latter had marginally greater support than the concept of a solid, vegan, palm oil, plastic, paraben and detergent free shampoo bar. Launched in 2018, the shampoo was delivered more quickly.

Our unscented Cosy Cottage shampoo bars are handmade in small batches, from four, plant derived oils. They’re uncoloured, un-preserved, unadded-to, unfiddled-with and un-adulterated with detergents or pseudo-natural surfactants. When this picture was taken, I had been using them to wash my hair for five years. It was, and still is longer and feels better than ever. In the picture, it was a bit wobbly at the ends as I hadn't managed to bag a haircut since shortly before lockdown 1 a year begore.

It’s time to get a few things straight!

• Using our solid shampoo will make your hair look like your hair
• Sucking a Halls Mentho-Lyptus won’t turn you into an opera singer

The water where we live is hard. The staircase is steep, dark and freezing. A journey to the kitchen to source lemon juice or cider vinegar is unthinkable. It took several washes before I learned to use sufficiently scant shampoo and to rinse efficiently. Once or twice, I have been sufficiently well organised to equip myself with the necessary ingredients for a ‘10% cider vinegar final rinse’ and my hair was indeed super-shiny and lovely.

One wintery day in late 2017, Channel 4’s ‘Ten Years Younger’ showed me a new path! Happiness was to be found in smooth skin, permanent make-up and shiny, blonde hair rather than great friends, family, good food and a positive outlook. It was the ‘intensely nourishing’ after-colour gloop which contained the angels of eternal shininess, who coated my hair with fairy dust and brilliance. Without the help of detergents, the clinging angels of eternal shininess took several, residue-clogged washes to remove. The colour was very jolly but it’s long gone now.

Since launch in 2018 we’ve made over 50,000 shampoo bars. Every week we are delighted to speak to people making a transition: leaving the angels of eternal shininess, their detergents, their gloop and their plastic bottles behind to meet and greet their own hair. Every week we receive feedback from people who have fallen in love with their own hair, protected by their bodies’ natural oils, growing at a new pace, curling in new directions. Occasionally we hear from people who would like to suck a Halls Mentho-Lyptus and be turned into an opera singer.  

Thank you to everyone who has chosen to shop with us or with our retail partners. We wish you and your loved ones well and look forward to many more happy times with hugs, laughter and companionship.