Hi y'all,

These are all old posts .. the link below is where they can be found.
I don't have the time to review them for changes .. and if I did those
changes would not match what you see if you go to the link. But there
is one thing I will comment on now .. that's the portion about oils
that are Certified Organic being better .. that's no longer true in
all cases .. Certification has gone corrupt in many cases and in other
cases it is just inefficient .. sloppy .. political .. and besides
that the oils themselves are not certified .. even the plants from
which the oils "should" have been extracted are not certified .. its
the ground in which the plants are grown that is certified. So if one
can ensure the ground is as it should be .. and that the plant is
taken from that ground .. and the oil is taken from that plant .. and
there was no mixing of oils after they were produced from those plants
then you can be sure you have a Certified Organic product. Odds are
not good that one can do that.

Y'all keep smiling. :-) Butch http://www.AV-aT.com

http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/oils_herbs_etc/message/8728

Shelf Life ** Rose Otto and Other EO

Sun Nov 3, 2002 4:16 am


Hi y'all,

Now you folks didn't really think Ol' Butch wuz gonna let you get away
that easy did you? ;-p

Somebody once asked:
> Woodwards book on essential oils that I've been reading through
> mentions that essential oils lose their potency after 2 years.
> Is this true?

And I replied:
Yes! They become deadly poison and will kill within minutes of anyone
smelling them. ;-p

Truth is that's not the truth. Sorta like human critters, there's no
such thing as an "Expiration Date." There's a ballpark Shelf Life on
EOs and on human critters .. and we can shorten it or lengthen it by
taking good care of it or by neglecting it .. but there's no date or
period of time when EOs turn to poison or humans turn to pumpkins. We
must ask why the writer wrote that? Does the writer wish to deceive
us? Or does the writer not know? Either way, I would look at other
things in the book with a jaundiced eye.

Some oils gets better with age .. Rose and Sandalwood and some others
get even better and better and better. If you can find some Sandalwood
from the 1940s or 1950s, you got yourself a gold mine, But lemme tell
you something about determining Shelf Life in general then I'll get
more into Rose Otto .. done told you all you need to know about
Sandalwood.

One of my Taiwanese customers once told me that they saw a post on the
aromatherapy list in Taiwan where someone had purchased my product and
was discussing the Dates of Expiration on my Miron Violet Bottles.
I HAVE NO DATES OF EXPIRATION ON MY BOTTLES!! I will never have them.
What they were seeing was the Date of Production .. which is widely
discussed by me and shown on my website.

Why will I not use a Date of Expiration or even a Best Use By Date?
Because it is impossible to determine an Expiration Date on an oil
because it will be different for different people - depending on how
they store the oils. Like I said, essential oils are much like people -
and we have a supposed Shelf Life - but we can extend or shorten
either one depending on the care or lack of care we give our bodies -
and our essential oils.

So what you find on MY bottles are Dates of Production - and this is a
rare thing because few folks do this. See the close up of my labels
at http://www.AV-AT.com/explain.html I do this so the knowledgeable
people can determine the "approximate" Shelf Life of their oils. If we
don't know when a child was born, or an essential oil was distilled,
we have no information upon which to base a determination of Shelf
Life - right? Why don't more people put the Production Date on the
lable? The answer is an easy one .. its a big pain in the ass and each
time you get a new batch of oils, the old labels become obsolute. Mine
are printed by a professional printing agency so this is also
expensive. Also, it might be because they or their wholesaler either
don't know the Date of Production or they know but don't want to tell
us? What do you think?

There are ways of getting around that .. one is easy but also easy to
abuse. Merely list the Dates of Production on the website. But a much
better way to do it and still avoid having the expense and loss of
your preprinted labels would be to associate the Date of Production
with the Lot Control Number of the GC or GC/MS analysis test.

Wait a minute? Something's missing here. Most folks don't offer a GC
or GC/MS analysis test. ;-p So .. if they don't want to list the Date
of Production on the label, and don't offer a Lot Number controlled GC
or GC/MS analysis test .. the only way left to determine the Date of
Production is to believe the seller .. who probably doesn't know ..
else they would tell you .. or take a WAG!

Granted .. it's a pain-in-the-butt to change oils and have to retest
and prove they are quality .. and assign a different Lot Control
Number .. this is required with each new batch one buys as its a new
Production Date. I do it all the time and the folks buying from me
know what they're doing when they spend the money .. I gotta cater to
customers anyway to stay in business so why not make it easier on me
and them at the same time?

It tracks that if we don't know the Date of Production we can't know
the expected Shelf Life. Without Date of Production, if they just
indicate a Date of Expiration on the bottle, it serves no purpose but
to give us a false sense of security - we still must guess - just as
the seller most likely guessed. And lemme tell you that many sellers
guess.

Though Essential oils have no magic Expiration Date like Cinderella's
pumpkin, and make no miraculous change at the stroke of midnight on a
day of expiration .. or even in a particular month that might be
related to a date of expiration .. there are some writers of
aromatherapy novels that say this because they have insufficient
information and/or are too lazy to do proper research.

For Citrus Oils - you can tell when it is bad because it will not
smell like the fruit from which it was taken. Since they are almost
always Cold Pressed or Expressed (not distilled) oils, its best to go
with Certified Organic so they have an even a better chance for life
as there have been no harmful chemicals used on the tree or fruit.

Under normal storage conditions, Citrus Oils can be expected to last
18 months before there is chemical degradation. BUT if its kept in
proper storage conditions, it will stay fresh for two years or so. We
keep all of our oils under conditions that do not allow oxydation ..
it is light and oxygen that shortens the life of any chemical
substance (actually, that's what ages us humans critters too). We keep
our Citrus Oils and German Chamomile refrigerated and under Nitrogen -
which displaces oxygen. I have some Lime that is almost three years
old - not selling it but I can guarantee that it is some of the finest
I've ever seen.

We keep the rest of our oils in an airconditioned store room in summer
and that storeroom is unheated in the winter.

Some folks want fresh oils - but many oils improve with age and the
cost also goes up .. just a few are Lavender, Rose Otto, Sandalwood,
Vetiver but I could go on and on. I save some of these oils now and
don't want to sell some of them for another few years .. they will be
more valuable then. All wines do not turn into gourmet vintage wines -
some turn to vinegar, but others become more valuable - same with EOs.

Mints - fresh is not best! Mint oils distilled in the USA in June have
a higher menthol content but those distilled in August and/or
September (closer to flowering) have a higher menthone and
menthofurane content - which is GOOD! As for peppermint and spearmint
- most US distillers sell fresh oils to Wriggleys and other
confectionary companies - but for aromatherapy, they hold it back for
a year. They keep it in a dark area, unsealed, and decant back and
forth between bottles to aerate it. Then they do a nitrogen flush
(replace oxygen with nitrogen) and seal it. That oil will last a good
3 plus years if properly stored.

For Rose Otto - fresh is not best!!! The Date of Production of the
Rose Otto I have sold in the past was always more than a year older
than the time I sold it. Unfortunately, that is not possible this year.

The Turkish Rose Otto Association used go keep Rose Otto in vaults and
they sold the fresh Rose Otto to perfumeries .. but the aged Rose Otto
went to me for the Aromatherapists. There was over 43 million dollars
worth of Rose Otto produced by my distiller in June 2001 .. only
large, Cooperative organizations could afford to sit on such an
investment - but even they couldn't do that once the run on Turkish
Rose Otto began. The small growers in Bulgaria and even in Turkey
can't afford to do that so they have always sold only the fresh Rose Otto.

Generally, the Shelf Lives of some essential oils are:

Tea Tree - shelf life is a minimum of Five Years.

Frankincense, Vetiver, Sandalwood and Patchouli - Indefinite and they
improve with age.

Other Wood and Resin oils - Ten years and longer.

Rose Otto - 8 to 10 years and they improve with age.

Citrus and Conifer oils - Assuming no preservative has been added (and
there is none in mine) - easily up to 18 months and longer if stored
under nitrogen or refrigerated.

Most Herbal/Floral oils, and most Absolutes - Four years or so.

Everything else - Four to Seven years.

In order to extend the Shelf Life of Cold-Pressed or Expressed citrus
oils, they are best kept in the refrigerator - the same is true with
hydrosols. If you can't do that, keep them in as cool an area as you
can.

DO NOT put Rose Otto or Anise in the refrigerator as it will
crystalize FAST but both will return to normal when you take them out
again. Fact is, they'll both crystalize in your home in the winter.

Keep Essential Oils in colored glass, out of the light, tops on tight,
out of sight and treat them right .. ;-p When a bottle is starting to
empty, put the oil into a smaller bottle - this reduces the amount of
oxygen in the bottle. Oxygen and light are not good for any chemical.
Don't expose essential oils to extreme temperatures - neither hot nor
cold nor rapid changes of temperature are good for EOs or Hydrosols.

Remember that EXACT Expiration Dates and Best Used By Dates are
garbage! It just is NOT TRUE! It totally depends on the methods of
storage - but you must know Date of Production - that is important
information. Date of Production is the time we begin our planning and
calculations. Most sellers, if they use a date at all, use the date it
was BOTTLED because that is all they know .. and that doesn't tell us
the Date of Production as it might have been 4 years old when it was
bottled.

So to recap and hope y'all remember this .. it is true that there are
general "expected" dates of the Shelf Life for various oils - and also
various humans. None have the same Shelf Life and we can increase or
decrease Shelf Life of humans or of any substance containing chemicals
if we store it and maintain it correctly or incorrectly.

So Bobbye - you ask a one-liner and get a book .. ;-p

Now I'm going back to work .. getting all the data together to add
some new oils and lots of replacement oils to my Retail site .. and do
a bit of jiggling with the Wholesale site.

Y'all keep smiling, Butch http://www.AV-AT.com

Wholesale/Retail GC Tested EO, Rose Otto, Hydrosols and other goodies
shipped to you from Downtown Friendsville, Maryland .. population 600.