When looking to buy essential or vegetable (base) oils you can be quite dumfounded by the array of oils, claims regarding origins, purity, organics, chemistry and so on but it really isn't that difficult if you understand the basics of the essential oil market.

 

Firstly, understand that the oils come from plants which are grown the world over - sometimes wild, sometimes grown on farms and sometimes cultivated commercially in vast greenhouses.

 

Secondly, understand that there are many methods of extracting oil from plants - sometimes the oil is distilled using steam. Some oils are extracted by "squeezing" as in the case of citrus oils. Sometimes using infusion whereby the plant is put into an oil  (usually sunflower) and its essence "infuses" into the host (as with Calendula or Carrot) or maceration when the plant is chopped up and put into a carrier (again usually Sunflower). Sometimes the plant is "pressed" as with Olive or Wheat and many of the nut oils. Sometimes, a solvent is used (as with Camelia) or a tree can be "tapped" and the oil simply exudes out of the "wound".

 

Thirdly, understand that good quality essential and base oils can be very expensive which gives a major opportunity to the less scrupolous to make a lot of money by selling inferior oils or blending expensive oils with cheaper oils or adding synthetic oils (made in a laboratory) to natural oils or even passing off synthetic oils as natural.

 

Now for some simple facts:

Ask yourself what you need from the oil you want to buy. At Katseye, our business is clinical aromatherapy and our customers are largely looking for oils that deliver to therapeutic expectation and applications. For this reason we have our own biochemist who sources and buys our oils on the basis of their therapeutic validity from a pool of a great many importers and wholesalers - no one wholesaler can possible carry a 100% stock of therapeutic grade oils for they are all in competition with each other to buy from the growers and the very fact that they need to maintain a full stock list means that they will invariably be forced to compromise on certain oils or not carry a full list of oils which would be commercial suicide.

 

So, if you need therepeutic grade oils, you will need to buy from someone who, like Katseye Blends, only supplies oils for the therapeutic market (buying from wholesalers can be very hit or miss).  

 

However, do you really need therepeutic grade oils?

 

Basil is a common plant grown the world over and has 680 varieties - at one end of the spectrum it can effectively treat referred pain whilst at at the other end of the spectrum, it is an effective digestive tonic, other species are better suited for treating colds.

 

English Lavender is best for respiratory complaints. French Lavender is best for balancing sebum levels in the skin and has a better fragrance for perfumes etc. whilst Bulgarian is the best (in my opinion) all round Lavender.

 

Ylang Ylang is available in a number of levels from Ylang Ylang through Levels 1,2 to Ylang Ylang Extra (the only one we use and supply).

 

The best Indian Sandalwood delivers to all therepeutic expectations but is twice the price of Australian Sandalwwod of the same species (Santalum Album) which, in turn, is almost twice the price of another variant (Santalum Spicatum) which also mostly comes from commercial farms in Australia - I have come across oil sold as high quality Indian Sandalwood which has been adulterated with the cheaper Australian or East African varieties (a Kilo of Indian Sandalwood Essential can cost around £2,000 whereas East African Sandalwood can be under £1,000).

 

Olive oil is another good example of the oil market. The best oil comes from the best olives grown around the Meditaranean. The olives are gathered in and put into a large contraption which has a large "screw" like contraption which is turned by hand and squeezes the olives till the oil runs out - this is "cold pressing" by hand or mechanical means and it produces a thick, green, cloudy oil which has all the goodness you could wish for - this is the oil I use in my kitchen. The extra virgin, cold pressed oil may sometimes be filtered to remove the "cloudiness" but it is still extra virgin, cold pressed oil. It doesn't stop there though,  the remaining pulp is then pressed again using industrial presses (usually hydraulics with heat) to get more oil (little therapeutic value), this is "Virgin Olive Oil". Lastly, even more oil is extracted using solvents giving us the cheapest Olive oil but with no therapeutic value at all.

 

So the real question is, what do you need it for?

 

If only for fragrance then buy, for example, French Lavender blended with Lavedin as it is so much cheaper and smells pretty good. If you're making soap then buy East African Sandalwood (Osyris Tenifolia) rather than paying more than twice as much for the Indian (Santalum Album).

 

If you're simply frying food then use the cheapest oils rather than the hand cold-pressed oils.

 

Bottomline - if you want oils that deliver to therepeutic expectations then don't think you can buy them from a market stall or find them at a cut price and understand that there are "fake" oils when you're talking about something than can cost £22 per 1ml (as in the case of Ambrette Seed) as much as there is fools gold and fake diamonds.