Be sure you are not using shea butter that has been contaminated by the use of unclean utensils and shea that has been sampled by person after person. You want your products that you will use on your skin, lips and hair to be properly stored and well contained to protect it's properties.

The Shea Butter suppliers often tout the quality of their Shea Butter however this industry has been misused and abused. I am embarrassed with what I have been exposed to in the manner in which Shea butter is shipped and stored. All in the name of Natural. Pay close attention to how the shea butter you are interested in is stored and managed and if you find in unsafe/unclean practices, I would not purchase it.

Shea in Skin Care
How is your Shea processed

When processing Shea Butter, the nuts, the trees should be inspected before collection. This is not always the case. You do not want Shea Butter that are sprayed with chemical pesticides, or fertilizers. The Shea nuts are good quality and healthy. Shea Butter comes in several forms. Nuts from different regions have different colors and textures. The use is also not interchangeable. If you use Gray Shea Butter for soap you don't want to turn around and use that same ingredient in lotions.

 
East Africa produces a greenish Shea Butter, but also a liquid type Shea Butter. Not really a butter at all but a thick oil. West Africa produces more than one kind as well. It depends on which area the nuts are harvested in. Each has different textures. RAW, Unfiltered and UnrefinedFiltering is the cleaning process and removes shells, and other matter that may have blended in the batch. Raw Shea Butter is filtered and contains no debris.

 
Shea Butter- Natural Filtered Unrefined has been filtered. Little or No, foreign matter is in the mixture. Keeps the natural oils and vitamins in tact. (This type has not been heat with high temperatures.)Deodorized Shea Butter There are so forms. Acquaint yourself on how your shea butter was refined. Filtered but not refined with chemicals or over heated and vacuum treated. Still not as good as Filtered Natural Shea Butter, but it the smells have been mostly removed. It's an acceptable product, as long as high temperatures have not been used.

 
Filtered, melted, then super-heated air is forced into the butter and the gases vacuumed out. Temperatures over 170 kill all vitamins present.

Refined Shea Butter has been filtered, super heated, then some processors use chemicals to do the refining process.

Ultra Refined Shea Butter - This has been filtered, super heated, then some processors use chemicals to do the refining process, and it's bleached to rid it of the yellowish tone.

 
Shea Butter has different naturally occurring components.

Processing-Make sure they don’t heat the Shea Butter during processing. Heating over 170* kills the vitamins. Excessive beating is destructive to Shea Butter. While this may congeal the elements naturally found in Shea Butter resulting in a softer product, it produces free radicals which will spoil the product faster. It is also damaging to the vitamins. The oxygen incorporated into the mixture also promotes rancidity.

 
This process should not in order that the natural healing benefits remain. A Good quality Shea Butter contains Shea Oil with the Olean still in tact. You’ll notice a less than perfect texture in the product if the two components are still present. Some inconsistencies in the texture because of that are normal.

 
Nice shea is creamy to touch, noticable to your skin that easily melt together into one nice consistency.

Be sure Your Shea Butter has been Tested! An independent lab should test all Shea Butters no matter what type.

Shea Butter