Peppermint Coffee Scrub: Use It Within 14 Days of Opening

Peppermint Coffee Scrub — $22.00, 4 oz. Lovely product, three things to know before you buy it.

1. Fourteen days. That is the whole shelf life once opened.

From our own label: "Best used within 14 days after opening."

That is unusually short and it is easy to miss. The reason is in the ingredient list: coffee, brown sugar, coconut oil, castor oil, sea salt, peppermint oil, vitamin E. All food-grade, and no preservative.

A preservative-free product that lives in a wet bathroom and gets fingers dipped into it is a genuine microbial risk. Two weeks is the honest window.

What that means practically:

• Buy it when you will actually use it — not to sit on a shelf
• Use a clean dry spoon, not wet fingers, to scoop it out. Our own directions say spoon it out, and that is why.
• Keep the lid on and store it somewhere dry, not in the shower
• If it smells off, looks changed, or has any moisture pooling in it, throw it away

At $22 for a two-week product, this is a treat rather than a staple, and it is fairer to say so up front.

2. It will make your shower floor slippery

Coconut oil and castor oil are two of the main ingredients. On a wet shower floor, that is genuinely slippery.

Rinse the floor properly afterwards, and be careful getting out. This is a mundane warning but a real one — oil-based scrubs cause falls.

The coffee grounds and sugar will also go down your drain. They are biodegradable, which is better than plastic microbeads, but a lot of oil and grit regularly is still not a drain's favourite thing.

3. Two claims on our own page that we want to walk back

Our product description says the scrub helps "smooth the appearance of cellulite" and produces a "skin-tightening effect."

Being straight: no scrub treats cellulite. Cellulite is a structural feature of how fat, connective tissue and skin are arranged. Massage and exfoliation can temporarily affect how skin looks by increasing surface blood flow — that is a short-lived appearance change, measured in minutes to hours, not a reduction in cellulite.

The same applies to "skin-tightening" and "reducing the appearance of wrinkles". What the scrub genuinely does is exfoliate, and leave skin feeling smooth and oiled. That is a good product. It does not need the rest.

What is actually in it

Organic Coffea Arabica (Coffee) Seed, Organic Sucrose (Brown Sugar), Organic Coconut Oil, Organic Castor Seed Oil, Sea Salt, Organic Peppermint Oil, Tocopherol (Vitamin E).

Seven ingredients, all food-grade, vegan and cruelty-free. The exfoliation is triple — coffee grounds, sugar and salt — which makes it a firmer scrub than a sugar-only product.

Who should go gently, or not at all

• Do not use it on irritated, broken or sunburnt skin
• Be careful on the face. Our page says it is suitable for face, body and feet, but coffee, sugar and salt together is a coarse combination for facial skin. If you use it there, use almost no pressure — or keep it for the body and use the facial cleanser on your face.
• Peppermint oil gives the cooling sensation. It can irritate sensitive skin and is not appropriate for young children.
• Not the same day as other exfoliation. If you use acids or retinol, do not add a physical scrub on top.
• Once or twice a week is plenty.

How to use it

Spoon out a handful, apply to damp skin, exfoliate gently, rinse with warm water. Moisturise afterwards — SheaWell or a tallow cream both work well on freshly exfoliated skin.

If it gets in your eyes, rinse thoroughly with clean water. Discontinue if irritation occurs.

If you want exfoliation that keeps

Our Exfoliating Luffa Bar is a bar of soap with luffa in it — no 14-day clock, no slippery oils, and it lives in the shower quite happily. Details here.