byHumankind Blood Orange Bergamot Body Wash Review | Zero-Waste Body Wash Bar
The Top Line:
Maybe. If you want to subscribe to the brand/really like byHumankind, then the Blood Orange Bergamot Body Wash bar is a good option. Overall, we like the byHumankind’s mission of reducing plastic waste and limiting ingredients. Unfortunately, at $15 per bar, this is the most expensive body wash bar we’ve reviewed thus far — but even then, byHumankind is cheaper than the cheapest liquid body wash when you calculate it on an annual basis.
The Breakdown:
Cost & Products: $15.00 for 1 bar of body wash; $5 for the diatomite soap dish. If you subscribe, you get 15% off and the dish comes free.
How ‘Clean’ Is This? Pretty clean; natural ingredients that have been saponified: Sunflower and coconut. Shea butter, jojoba oil, and olive oil also make an appearance. Does contain sustainably sourced palm oil (which might not actually be very sustainable). Scented with essential oils.
Packaging: Comes in a paper sleeve.
Purchasing & Shipping: Clean design, links are improving but still a little circular. Shopping and shipping were pretty straightforward and very fast for us. Free shipping over $15 (which is everything at the store) and byHumankind claims it is carbon neutral.
Good to know: Refill and subscription is the intention behind byHumankind’s business. The company tries to use limited ingredients, with a heavy emphasis on plastic reduction via packaging.
Coupons: If you subscribe, you get 15% off per 2 refills.
Extra Info: There is an option to subscribe to a plastic offset for $8/month. For that, 22lbs of plastic waste are removed from the ocean.
What’s Your Impact? Body washes are plastic and energy hogs. By using a concentrated body wash that comes in a form of a bar, the shipping weight it lighter and there is no plastic in the packaging.
The Experience
Context: Wanting to limit plastic (and be more cost conscious), we largely switched over to bar body soaps a few years ago. We were not paying much attention to the ingredients in the bars of soap and we mainly purchased grocery or drugstore brands like Whole Foods brands, Olay, Yardley, Dove, and your occasional artisanal soap we found while traveling.
The Blood Orange Bergamot scent is very light
Does not dry out skin
Lathers nicely (we use a cotton washcloth)
We’ve been using it for 3 weeks so far, and barely have made a dent in it (Yes, we shower at least once per day. Yes, even in quarantine. )
The Cost
We compared byHumankind’s Body Wash Bar to typical drugstore brands as well as Grove Collaborative, Cleancult, Pre de Provence, and Dr. Squach Soap bars. On average, a family of four will use 30oz of bar soap (as opposed to over 40 bottles of body wash!)
Money Report: Holy schnikes, that is expensive. As we mentioned earlier, we haven’t made a dent in this soap over the last 3 weeks, so we think it might last longer than the Grove Collaborative Cedar soap. We are just not sure if it will last 3x longer (it would need to last about 24 weeks).
We will mention, however, that liquid body washes can cost anywhere from $3-10 per bottle, which comes to an annual cost of $120 to $400 per year for a family of 4. ByHumankind, while the most expensive is still cheaper than the cheapest body wash.
The Good:
✔ Subtle scent - scented with essential oils of blood orange, bergamot, sweet orange, lemongrass
✔ Cheaper than liquid body wash
✔ Zero-waste, zero-plastic body wash
✔ Made of limited, natural ingredients
The Bad:
✗ The most expensive bar option we’ve reviewed thus far
✗ If you’re looking for a stronger scent, byHumankind is not it
Our Recommendation:
Maybe. If you want to subscribe to the brand/really like byHumankind, then the Blood Orange Bergamot Body Wash bar is a good option. Overall, we like the company’s mission. At $15 per bar, this is the most expensive body wash bar we’ve reviewed thus far — but even then, byHumankind is cheaper than the cheapest liquid body wash when you calculate it on an annual basis.
We're on a mission to reduce our personal carbon footprint with small, hopefully easy, changes in our home to fight against climate change. This means we're looking for products that may be all natural, ideally zero waste, reusable or compostable -- while still being affordable!
