[Music] hi I'm Belinda Carly the director of the Institute of personal care science and I get asked a lot about writing up formulas and how to write formulas and provide the correct information in the formula so today I'm gonna talk you through an example of a bad formula and some of the key features that we would need to change and how we should be writing up good formulations now if you've looked at any of my free formulation videos and if you've contacted us for the formulas and of course they're all freely available just email us info at personal care science common value and we'll give you the link to every single formula and report that we run on this channel but a lot of times people will ask me questions about the formulas like why is it written in percentage and why have I use trade names and and things like that in my formulas so I'm going to address some of those aspects in this video for you as well and I've created this video specifically for the smaller brands for those just starting out or who are making product on a small scale and maybe want to take a bigger later but this is a video for you and it's going to help you know what your formulas should be reading like to help you be ready for when you're ready to take that next step to bigger manufacture or even taking your formula to a contract manufacturer what should that formula be like how do you write a proper cosmetic formula so now first of all let me show you a bad example and I'm going to talk you through a few things in this formula that makes it a bad example now let me first start by saying the actual ingredients selections aren't the problem so when I've created this bad formulation example it's not because it's a bad formula it's the way it's written and in this video I'm going to be explaining how you should be providing the information and then at the end I'm going to give you the same formula but written in its proper format and this just means that then you can make any batch so as you want easily you can convert the inputs really easily no matter your batch size you'll be able to convert your equipment to larger scale production easily and you can even take your formula to a contract manufacturer knowing that they will be able to reproduce the same product for you you wouldn't be able to do any of that accurately from the way the formula is currently written so let me talk you through some of the things that are wrong with this formula and then I'm going to talk you through how to make them right first of all you'll see that this formula is written to make 75 jars now the very first thing you need to do whenever you write a formula is to write it to 100% now I've got this great little table summarizing what you shouldn't do and what you should do that you can get easily just by contacting us info at personal-care science comm today you and will give you all of this information we're very happy to provide it to help you out so one of the first things you absolutely should not be doing is writing your formula to a specific batch size or quantity of jars or bottles you should be writing the formula to 100% by weight it says number one step that they've done wrong the very next thing that is wrong in this formula is that it's a mixture of volume and weight measures and even drops down here at the bottom so all of your formulas need to be written to 100% by weight and again if you look at our little list of what not to do and what to do you'll see that's the very next important thing mixture of milligram and drop measurements are not suitable you need to convert everything to a percentage by weight measure now you might be thinking well why do I need to do that if I've made my 75 jars and I'm really happy with my formula for that 75 jars why should I change anything well the problem becomes if you want to change from 75 jars it's really difficult for you to then make an accurate reproduction of this formula the way it's written whether you want 750 jars or 25 jars when you write a formula in percent by weight it means that everything is consistent so you can easily go from 100 of a batch to 100 kilograms of a batch because everything's written in percent so if I need 5% of an ingredient it's the same percentage ratio whether I'm making 100 grams of that product or whether I'm making 100 kilos the percentage calculation will always give me a very accurate input and when us percentage by weight so that we can be sure about the weight of the finished production batch size so again if we're talking about a hundred kilos of finished product then I know that 5% of that hundred kilos is going to be 5 kilos of an ingredient to use so using percent by weight means we can go from very small to very large batches easily and the calculations remain consistent and easy to calculate if written by percent weight input another thing that's wrong about this formula is the names of the ingredients are very ambiguous if I was to take this to a contract manufacturer and if they were to prepare me a sample of this product they may use very different materials to me for several of these inputs for example xanthan gum can come in a variety of grades and that can impact how the finished product is going to fill and also its viscosity this emulsifying wax is a very ambiguous description there are hundreds of emulsifying wax is out there I need to be specific with my manufacturer or even if I'm making this at home so that I can make sure I'm using the same brand of emulsifying wax every single time I don't want to just use inky names either like the xanthan gum or even like emulsifying waxes if I was to use inky names there's multiple grades out there that can have a big difference on the viscosity and stability of my finished product so I should be very specific about these types of ingredients fractionated coconut oil again is quite an ambiguous description I'm in Doyle and avocado oil these could come in varying grades they could be refined they could be deodorant it depends on the supplier and the macadamia doesn't even have a plant part so I don't know if it's an oil or a butter so I need more information I've also got some other really ambiguous descriptions here that you might not have thought were that ambiguous to begin with I've got a preservative blend using inky names but there's a few different varieties of this material out there so again I should be using a trade name or a supplier name so that the specific grade can be purchased each time and that way I'll get a consistent result vitamin E again am i using a natural version or a synthetic version am i using an acetate version which won't give any antioxidant protection to my formula or am i using a tocopherol version which work is the antioxidant protection it's not specified so if I was to purchase the wrong vitamin E some time I might get a very different outcome in my finished product in its shelf life for example my essential oil blend should be part of my main formula not separated out over here and even in that essential oil blend you can see I've listed out lemon myrtle essential oil lavender and sandalwood but there's multiple varieties of each of these materials which means if a different type of lavender was used I could end up with a very different aroma each time and sandalwood do I want to use the Australian sandalwood or East Indian sandalwood they both have very different aromas and very different pricing so I should be much more specific about the ingredients that I'm using a new supplier or trade names let's take a look at an example for that so for example the first one was looking at our most the fires over here on formulator samples shop website you can see here I've just looked up their emulsifiers and I've got all of these different results which are mole supplying wax am I using let's say in this example that I want to select the montón of 68 MB here then I should specify in my formula montón of 68 MB and then there is no confusion about what material I've used now remember your formula doesn't have to include your Inca names your Inca names need to appear on your label for your consumer but they don't necessarily have to go in your formula but a specific trade name and suppliers details should so that the same material is purchased every single time another example was that fractionated coconut oil again if I just type in coconut in formulator sample shop website I get all these choices and if I want to be really specific I should be writing caprylic copra triglycerides MCT from formulator sample shop and then there's no confusion about which grade of material and even which supplier I've used to get this particular ingredient over here on the new directions website just an example to show you if I just type in lavender I get all sorts of results and even just their essential oil with there's cape lavender there's Australian's has mainly an essential oil Bulgarian essential oil French essential oil which one am i using they're all very different prices and different aromas so I'd get a lot of batch to batch variation if I'm not more specific about the material I'm using while also on new directions I've got licorice extract in my formula but again am I talking about a powder am I talking about a glycerin base liquid extract or am I talking about an organic extract my formula needs to be specific about this so that I can use the same material every single time and more importantly if I want to give my formula to a contract manufacturer so that they use exactly the same materials that I've used every single time to get the same result another thing that's wrong with the way this formula is written is the ingredients are not phased out we don't have any phasing information so another problem is the way the methods written first of all we shouldn't be naming individual ingredients we should be naming the phases so that there can't be any confusion or ingredients forgotten so we talk in terms of phases combined phase a heat phase B and then we're very specific about what we're doing with each material as we go along another thing that's not good about this method and would be a real problem if we want to start going to larger batches we don't have any endpoints or any specific temperatures what do I mean by that well we say we want to add it to hot water but how hot should that water be and if we're stirring for five minutes are we stirring at low shear or high shear and we shouldn't specify time either because what's five minutes mixing for a small batch and might be sufficient five minute mixing of a large batch may be nowhere near enough time to ensure the entire batch is mixed properly so we don't generally write a time in our general method because the time would be determined by the batch size and the equipment used and that really needs to be done at the time of manufacture specific to the size of the batch being made but you don't want to write your formula like that because then you can't transfer it from a small batch to a large batch easily remember you can add that detail later when you know exactly what batch size you want to make and exactly what equipment you're going to use but your general method for your formulas should be written in a way that suits both small and large batches so we shouldn't put that time in there because it may not be enough mixing for a large batch and it may be too much mixing for a small batch but what is important is to be specific about temperatures and be specific about low or high shear mixing now if you're not sure what I mean by that please watch another video I have for you which talks you through different types of mixes that you can use to make your cosmetic products and it talks about low or high shear and you also need some end points so in step one if we're combining the glycerin and xanthan gum and adding to the hot water what would be an endpoint how do we know when step one is completed we would know when we've got a nice homogeneous gel that has formed if we're heating phase a B and heating phase C and then we're combining to form our emulsion how would we know when that step is complete we know when we have a nice glossy looking emulsion that has formed and then we can start cooling these our endpoints that suit small or large scale production and of course then when you do know specifically how much product you want to make and you do know specifically which equipment you're using you could insert times of mixing but you can't when you're writing a generalized method so instead you should have specific temperatures specific endpoints to look for and be specific about low or high shear mixing another issue on this formula is there's no mention about final pH you should be writing your formula with a final pH where there's water present and that pH range should be relatively tight to make sure that the finished product made today is still of the required quality in a couple of years when that pH may have drifted a little and pH will drift it's a very normal phenomenon for cosmetic emulsions for that pH to drift over time but you don't want it to drift too much otherwise it becomes a big stability or shelf-life issue so you need to start your manufacture and your method with a very tight pH range so that any drift over time does not become so large that it creates a quality issue so now I've summarized that information for you here in this table let's take a look at how it reads in a better version of this formula now as I've mentioned I have used the same formula but I've now put it into its corrected format so let's look at the things that you should be doing what you'll see straightaway is I have converted it to 100% and I have converted all inputs to percent by weight the very first step we need to do the next thing that I've done is I've been very specific about trade names and grade names as well as the supplier and that way there's no confusion over which materials I've got from which supplier now again I've created this video for smaller brands so I'm using smaller scale suppliers for you but the same methodology of writing your formula applies if you're writing a formula for larger scale production and using some of the larger scale suppliers which you'd see in the formulas that we provide with other more professional formulation videos you'll also see for the botanical materials in particular I've been very specific about the name and the supplier and some of those essential oils I've been very specific about them too so the lemon myrtle natural blend essential oil that's exactly what New Directions call that particular grade of material the sandalwood have specified a sandalwood Australian again so it's very clear about which material are selected so - with the lavender essential oil and that licorice root extract there's now no confusion over exactly which grade of material I've used especially because of also named the supplier of that material so that even if you wanted to reproduce this product you could go to this supplier and get the exact same grade of material that I used and get the exact same result that I did from the formulation you'll also notice that I've phased the ingredients over here so the ingredients are phased based on how they are put into the formula together or not and then down here in the method you'll see that I talked about phases not individual ingredients and that way nothing can be missed accidentally you'll see that I have got my end points at each step and I've also been very specific about temperature I've also been very specific about shear low shear here why shear here and those endpoints that help with any scale-up procedure you will know that you just need to adjust your time of mixing depending on the batch size and equipment used because your endpoint tells you how long you're going to need to stir it for and that you this example is too we have a smooth glossy emulsion so that's an example of how being specific with the temperatures being specific with the endpoints and being specific with the shear helps us be able to scale a batch from a very small threat of very large batch and know how long should we be stirring this for until we've achieved these end points finally you'll also see that I have included my pH adjuster and I've also been very specific about that final pH and when to check it now if you're not that familiar with the concepts of pH we do have a video on pH adjustment and when you're making a formula you can't know whether you need to adjust the pH up or down or whether you need to adjust it at all you also will find this batch to batch variation of just how much of these pH adjusters are needed which has a lot to do with various materials and sometimes even your water quality so we can't write exact amounts into formulas and we can't write whether we're going to need citric acid or sodium hydroxide for example because we don't know so it is quite okay and in fact required that we write Q s pH adjuster and that means as much as needed to achieve this end point here and again by having this end point stated specifically it means that no matter if I'm making a hundred grams or a hundred kilos or even a thousand kilos of this product I can be very specific about that end point every single time it just helps the formula be reliably translated from a small batch right through to a large batch regardless of the type of equipment or batch size that you might be making so there you go that's how to write up your cosmetic formulas now if you've been using a combination of volume and weight in the past you'll just need to start weighing out what you've been using and then start calculating a total there and then work your percentages from that and that way you'll have a consistent conversion every single time make sure you look up those supplier details and be specific in your formulas so that you are using the same materials every single time and especially if you're going to be giving your formula to a contract manufacturer to recreate for you I hope you found this video useful remember just contact us for any of our free reports or formulas or information from this video as well please give the video a thumbs up please leave any questions or comments below and make sure you subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive notifications about all our formulations happy formulating [Music]