Dr. Bronner's Pure Castile Soap - Peppermint - 16 fl oz

A: In the soap section.

A: It is usually in the Health & Beauty section in the natural beauty products aisle. It's usually found on the bottom shelf close to the ground. Good luck!

A: Thank you for contacting Dr. Bronner's! While our soaps clean dishes very well, we do not recommend using our soap in the dishwasher and currently do not offer a soap specifically for use in the dishwasher. Our soaps are great cleaners for almost any household purpose, with the only notable exception being that they should not be used in the dishwasher unless you’d like to have a bubble party on your kitchen floor! Some customers say that our soaps have worked in their dishwashers, but we simply can’t recommend them as they suds too much. Even though there are no foaming agents, added for the sole purpose of creating more foam, the fact that our soaps are highly concentrated makes them high foaming. Our soaps do a great job of cleaning the dishes, but they could cause damage to your dishwasher because it gets overfilled with suds. If you do decide to try it, we suggest using a tiny amount of soap. To handwash your dishes with either our Pure-Castile Liquid Soap or Sal Suds Biodegradable Cleaner, we recommend a couple of methods. The first is to fill your sink with water and add either 1-2 Tbsp. (15-30 mL) of our soap or 1/2 – 1 1/2 tsp. (2.5 mL) of Sal Suds. If you prefer to use a dispenser, we recommend only using a foaming pump dispenser. Our Pure-Castile Soaps are quite concentrated and inevitably, the regular pumps always clog. For use in a foaming pump, dilute either ¼ cup Tbsp. (60 mL) of soap or 1 Tbsp. (15 mL) of Sal Suds into an 8oz container of water. You are aiming for a 1:3 ratio for the soap and a 1:15 ratio for our Sal Suds. The last way we recommend is to make an all-purpose spray cleaner by combining ¼ c. (60 mL) of soap or 1 Tbsp. (15 mL) Sal Suds with 1 qt. (1 L) water or in a spray bottle. Then all you need to do is spray the dirty dishes down and scrub them. You can find a full breakdown of how to make an all-purpose spray also of Lisa Bronner's blog, Going Green with Lisa Bronner. (https://www.lisabronner.com/giy-all-purpose-cleaning-spray/) When diluting our soaps, please keep in mind that we only recommend diluting a portion that will be used up within 2 weeks to a month. We do not add any harsh preservatives to our products, so once diluted, they will not last longer than 1 month. Using distilled water will be more helpful since hard water can cause separation within our Castile Soap. Lastly, if you have hard water, it is possible to encounter some mineral build-up when using our Pure-Castile Soap. The interaction of hard water, and even soft water, with any true soap (not synthetic detergent-based soaps), can leave behind a thin film of minerals that appears as residue or “soap scum.” Hard water contains dissolved minerals in the form of calcium and magnesium. All true soaps, such as castile soap, will react with these minerals to form insoluble stearates, which are visible as a whitish precipitate. This whitish precipitate builds up primarily on surfaces where water is left to dry, such as in sinks and showers. It is typically not an issue on floors, counters, or other hard surfaces where the castile soap is diluted for cleaning and standing water is mopped or wiped up. You can easily dissolve residue left from our soap with vinegar by diluting one cup (240 mL) of vinegar in a quart (1 L) of water and spraying it on the affected surfaces. Let it sit for about 5 minutes (not long enough for it to dry), and then rinse it away with very hot water. Should you have any future questions, please don’t hesitate to let us know.

A: While both our Pure-Castile Liquid Soap and Sal Suds Biodegradable Cleaner can work very well to clean leather car interiors, it is important to reach out to the manufacturer in the case that there is a special cleaner for this surface. Rest assured that if the finish manufacturer calls for a mild cleaner, both all-purpose sprays fit the bill. If you have a surface that is unusual, spot-testing is always a good idea. While Castile Soap is a great cleaner, Sal Suds is great for spot-treating carpets and for cleaning leather and microfiber furniture. It’s also great on cars and for degreasing engines. Depending on what you have on hand, either the Sal Suds All-Purpose Spray (1 Tbsp. in a quart of water) or the Castile All-Purpose Spray (¼ c. in a quart of water) will do a quick clean. If the leather needs to be nourished, you may want to consider a leather polish made from ⅓ c. vinegar with ⅔ c. olive oil and ½ tsp. pure essential lemon oil. Shake this up and rub it on with a soft rag. We do want to mention that if you are using our Pure-Castile Soap and have hard water, it is possible to encounter some mineral build-up. Rest assured that this is completely normal as the interaction of hard water, and even soft water, with any true soap (not synthetic detergent-based soaps), can leave behind a thin film of minerals that appears as residue or “soap scum. Please note that our products are not specifically formulated for interior car cleaning, and we have not tested them for all types of fabrics, including vegan leather. Our Organic Hand and Body Lotion, Organic Hair Crème, and Organic Hand Sanitizer are the only products we currently manufacture that contain alcohol as an ingredient. Should you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us.

A: Hi Emily, Thanks for reaching out! We use citric acid in almost all products as a pH adjuster. Our All-One Toothpaste also uses it as a chelating agent to solubilize any mineral elements, making the product more stable. Our soaps use it to neutralize any unreacted hydroxide that’s left over from the saponification reaction (soap-making process). Each batch of soap is carefully tested to see how much alkali remains, and then just enough citric acid is added to catch that alkali. The citric acid reacts so quickly with the hydroxide that it completely bypasses the soap molecules.

A: Hi Judy, While our soaps have been used around the garden area, we unfortunately cannot guarantee that they will get rid of Japanese Beetles. To read more about how to use this product around your garden, we invite you to visit the Lisa Bronner Blog, and check out the article "Castile Soap Spray for Garden Pests" https://www.lisabronner.com/castile-soap-spray-for-garden-pests/

A: Hey, Great question! Yes, we recommend to dilute when using the Dr. Bronner's Pure Castile Soap as a body wash. One small squirt can be applied to wet hands or a wash cloth to wash hands, face and body! For all your future beauty questions, get real-time answers using the “Chat with a Virtual Beauty Consultant” button, found on every product page.

A: Hello Vikki! We recommend you check out the Dilutions Cheat Sheet on the brands website for exact directions, we hope this helps!

A: Palm oil has always been an ingredient in our Pure-Castile Bar Soap. Where as Palm Kernel Oil was added to our Liquid Soaps in 2015. Palm oil in particular has special qualities that make it ideal for use in our Bar Soaps: when saponified, it gives our Bar Soaps hardness and stability while maintaining a smooth and emollient lather, qualities that we have simply been unable to match using other oils. We do not choose to use palm oil because it is cheaper or more abundant; on the contrary, we have gone to great lengths to ensure that our fair trade & organic palm oil is sustainably harvested in a way that does not damage the environment. All of our palm oil comes from small-holder farms in Ghana, where oil palms have been grown for centuries, and where no new deforestation is occurring. We are constantly striving to improve sustainability and we support growers with organic methods for improving palm fruit yields – thus getting more oil out of the same amount of land. In short, we believe that it is not simply what you grow, but how you grow it. You can read more about our palm oil project in Ghana on our All-One blog!

A: Our Pure-Castile Soap is not tear-free. The “tear-free” characteristic is one that can only be achieved with synthetic non-soap detergents, and it’s not something we’re able to do given the simple formulation of our soaps. We do make a Baby Unscented Pure-Castile Soap, which is not tear-free, but is more gently formulated for sensitive skin. It contains no essential oils and has more saponified olive oil than the other scents, which makes it even more moisturizing. However, please take care to keep it out of the eyes, as all true soaps are irritating to the eyes.