The Natural Deodorant Experiment #1 - does coconut oil work?

If you can believe even half of what you read on the internet, apparently coconut oil can be used for ANYTHING!! This natural deodorant experiments puts natural deodorant and no deodorant up against coconut oil. While we adore the white creamy goodness that is coconut oil, we've decided to put a few of these to the test. One that I've always been curious about is the use of coconut oil as a deodorant. Does it work, or does it need to be debunked? Over the last week, I've put it to the test. Here's the results.

Fresca Deodorant vs Coconut Oil

My favourite natural & aluminium free deodorant after testing several brands is most definitely the Fresca deodorant, so this was our benchmark for our natural deodorant experiment. For 3 days, one armpit received Fresca, the other had coconut rubbed on it. At the end of the day, the ultimate sniff test was performed. Each day, I had different activity levels. On a quiet day, there was a slight difference in odour, with Fresca the winner. On the day I spent out in the garden and raised a little bit of a sweat, the difference was significant. And again, Fresca was the clear winner. For someone who is truly athletic and active, I can only imagine the difference would be even greater.

Nothing vs Coconut Oil

So, for the next step of our natural deodorant experiment, now I know that, for me, using coconut oil doesn't work as well for a deodorant as the leading natural deodorant brand. But how does it compare with not using anything at all? I picked a day where I was home alone (aren't I nice) and used coconut oil under one armpit and nothing under the other one. At the end of the day, the armpit that smelt the best was actually the one with nothing on it. It wasn't a huge difference, but enough for me to notice and worth mentioning.

So why do people rave about using only coconut oil as deodorant?

I honestly don't know. The natural deodorant experiment has shown it really doesn't work. A quick google search will find you the recipes for several natural deodorants with coconut oil as a core ingredient, but they also contain the following ingredient/s in varying quantities and combos which would increase their effectiveness.

• baking soda
• arrowroot
• shea butter
• essential oils

We have a range of natural & organic essential oils in store, we're working on finding a solo source of shea butter and the others are simply purchased from the supermarket, although we have organic versions of the baking soda and arrowroot if they're already in your kitchen or if you have the money to spare and you buy your health food online through our shop.

Conclusion

Coconut oil on its own is was not an effective natural deodorant for me. Others have voiced a different opinion. If you have a jar in your pantry, it's worth a try. I will point out that the purpose of a natural deodorant is not to stop you from sweating. It is to stop the growth of bacteria under the armpits which is where the smell comes from. On its own, coconut oil did not do this for me. Fresca did. We do not advise the use of anti-perspirants, which stop you from sweating.

Your skin is the body's largest detox organ and blocking the act of detoxing around very important glands under your armpits is not a good idea. It's an even worse idea when you're exercising, so please, STOP using anti-perspirant when you go to the gym. You need to sweat. It's healthy. Just use something to stop the bacteria growth.

If you have had your own success or failure using a homemade natural deodorant, we'd love you to leave a comment.