Trader Joe’s Rants & Raves (mostly raves, a few rants)

RAVE 

I will start by saying I imagine I’m what you would call a “typical” male, meaning as far as soap goes, I am not too picky.

In fact, I am recalling I used to buy soap at the dollar store, where I got a brand called Dalan which was a buck for 3 bars back then and it was fine as far as I was concerned. On the other hand, you have my wife, who buys fancy soap at fancy stores like L’Occitane de Provence and the like. You know those upscale shops where soaps can cost $10 a bar?

Her fancy soaps are for her use only, of course. If I even touch her special bar of soap she will yell at me. “Don’t touch my soap; its for my face, its expensive, and its way too good for you”. Thanks, sweetie!

So shopping at Trader Joe’s a few weeks back I noticed this soap in their Health and Beauty section:

Trader Joe’s Oatmeal and Honey Soap, “Pure vegetable soap”. I can even smell it a bit and it smells nice. Cost? OMG, this nice looking soap goes for only$1.50 for 2 good size bars ($1.99). That sounds like my kind of deal, Joe!

The low down when I tried it? I like this soap a lot. Very good and for the price, terrific.

It doesn’t have any strong added artificial aromas. To me this soap has a nice natural smell.

When you wash with it this makes lots of lather. You can see oatmeal flakes in the soap. My skin does feel better, less dry, I assume due to the oatmeal in it. We know oatmeal is one of the best things for skin, incredibly soothing (see Aveeno brand for instance).

I mentioned how good this smells but it is worth repeating. Very nice. So here is one more TJ’s item I tried once and immediately said, “Wow this is an amazing product. I’m going to buy this from now on!”*.

This soap doesn’t melt too fast either, it lasts. It’s good for hands, face, body, everything. OK so I now get it, yes good soap is important. And one can easily say this decent soap is well worth it’s low price. Best thing is that my wife actually likes this soap. Sure she still loves her $10 L’Occitane soap but now keeps that solely for her face. I’m still not allowed to touch it of course but at least we can actually now agree that we can buy this “regular” soap for everyday use, and this is whats in our shower soap dish now. We both use it.

Trader Joe’s Oatmeal and Honey Soap, (two 4 oz bars). Ingredients include “…Glycerine, Essence of Oatmeal, Oatmeal Flakes, Honey…” TJ’s also sells a Tea Tree Oil Soap for a wee bit more.

Let us know about Trader Joe’s Health and Beauty stuff you’d recommend and leave some suggestions in the comments.

*How many times do Trader Joe products have that effect on you? There’s a reason. They have great buyers whose sole job is to scour the world for good products for Trader Joe’s.“

Price has increased since this was written… now $1.99. Still thats a buck for a bar. Not bad.