Soap Making Oils, Butters and Fragrances:
For purchasing supplies, numerous online sites offer a wide range of oils, butters, fragrances and other soap making equipment and supplies. While shipping isn’t cheap, doing a bigger batch order for supplies you’ll need for the foreseeable future can minimize some of those costs. The sites listed below have specialized in serving the soap making community for years and generally have good pricing and ship quickly.
For more common oils used in soap making such as coconut oil and olive oil, you can often find good deals in bulk at Sam’s Club, Costco or Walmart. It’s also sometimes cheaper to buy these online at Amazon depending on various sales or deals, especially if you’re already a Prime member. Below are links to some of the better deals on Amazon for olive oil and coconut oil:
Amazon Grocery – Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Pure Original Ingredients Coconut Oil – 1 gallon
When shopping for oil and butters, try to focus on the cost per ounce as the bottle size and amount can vary. Remember to factor in shipping as a slightly cheaper price per ounce online may end up being more expensive with shipping versus buying a slightly more expensive bottle in person at a retail store.
Soap Making Lye:
You can typically find sodium hydroxide at Ace Hardware, Walmart and Lowes under various brand names in the plumbing section where drain cleaners are sold. Check the ingredient label as you’re looking for a product with a single ingredient: 100% sodium hydroxide.
If you ask an employee where you can find lye or sodium hydroxide, you may be told they don’t sell it; some stores encourage employees to answer that way in order to discourage people trying to buy lye to use for nefarious purposes.
You can also buy lye online (at the suppliers at the top of this page as well as at Amazon and other sites) but pay close attention to shipping costs if your order includes lye. Some online retailers only ship lye with certain carriers that add a large surcharge for lye (like a ~$50 upcharge) so check estimated shipping costs before and after adding lye to your cart to make sure you’re not unnecessarily paying a lot more than you need to.
Soap Making Equipment
Infrared thermometer gun – Infrared Thermometer Laser Temperature Gun
Digital scale – BOMATA Waterproof IPX6 Kitchen Scale
Immersion blender – OVENTE Immersion Hand Blender
Electric skillet – Elite Gourmet EG2212 12″x12″x2.15 electric skillet
For Amazon products linked to on this page, we receive a small commission when you purchase through one of these links.