Grove Collaborative Cedar Soap Review 2020 | Zero Waste Body Wash
The Top Line:
BUY if you already have the Grove Collaborative membership. We love the unisex smell of the Cedar and Sage Soap and the limited and natural ingredients. It also feels great on our skin. Even though it is not the cheapest option, almost any of the fanciest bar soaps will be cheaper than using drugstore shower gels.
Plus, switching to bar soap removes the need for 40+ bottles of body wash per year for a family of four.
The Breakdown:
Cost & Products: $4.95 for 4oz bar of soap
How ‘Clean’ Is This? It has palm oil - but it’s Leaping Bunny certified. Otherwise, has natural/safe ingredients.
Packaging: Standard soap paper packaging - which we can do without.
Purchasing & Shipping: We have now ordered twice on the mobile site. The mobile site is so finicky that we ended up not ordering everything we wanted. The desktop site is a little better, but still not intuitive to navigate, since they have duplicate products listed.
PSA: The subscriptions are applied automatically. There is a ton of flexibility - but it’s on you to remember. If you try to order before your next due shipment, all of the items are pre-loaded into your cart. We like the thought behind it, but would prefer opt-in versus opt-out.
Coupons: None that we know of. Orders have minimum spend amounts for perks, which include additional products and free shipping. A lot of free gifts with purchases, including this soap for our last order.
Good to Know: Grove Collaborative is a B-corporation. Normal corporations have a goal to make more money for their owners. B-Corporations do that too, but they also set specific, social and ethical goals such as governance, environment, and workers. Read about Grove Collaborative’s goals here.
What’s your impact? No more plastic bottles for shower gel or body wash. Plus better ingredients that make it down your drain. We haven’t bought shower gel in years.
The average person uses 11 bottles of shower gel per year!
The Experience
Context: We have been using bar soap for years. One of our OG strategies in reducing plastic came from wanting to reduce our monthly bills. We had not paid much attention to the ingredients in the bars of soap - so we had mainly been purchasing drugstore brands like Dove, Whole Foods brand, Olay, or Yardley.
The Grove Collaborative soap lathers well
Rinses clean - does not leave a film or dry out skin
The particles are a mild scrub for us (when we don’t use a washcloth)
Smell is lovely and unisex
The Cost
We compared typical drugstore brands as well as 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: Not the cheapest option in bar soaps - but when compared to drugstore body washes, which cost anywhere from $3-10 per bottle (or $120-$400 per year for a family of four), then any bar soaps look like a bargain, even the Grove bar!
The Good:
✔ Smells really nice (unisex)
✔ Leaves skin soft
✔ Light exfoliating factor if you use directly on skin
✔ Minimal and natural ingredients
✔ Way cheaper than using body wash or shower gels
The Bad:
✗ It’s not the absolute cheapest bar option
✗ It does have palm oil in it :(
Our Recommendation:
BUY if you already have the Grove Collaborative membership. We love the unisex smell of this Grove bar soap (Cedar & Sage) and the limited and natural ingredients. Even though it is not the cheapest option — almost any of the fanciest bar soaps will be cheaper than using drugstore shower gels.
Plus, switching to bar soap removes the need for 40+ bottles of body wash per year for a family of four.
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!
