Preservatives: Choosing a preservative

So we've spent some time getting to know our preservatives, so let's take a look at what preservatives we might want to use and those we should avoid when creating our products.

Let's say you're making a scented body spray and you want to use polysorbate 20 to emulsify your fragrance into the water based product. Which preservative is right for this product? We know the parabens like Phenonip, Liquipar PE, and Germaben II are partially deactivated by polysorbate 20, so we might want to choose something else (say Liquid Germall Plus or Optiphen). I'd have the same problem with something like my foaming post-crafting hand wash because I use the polysorbate 20 to emulsify the d-Limonene.

Or let's say you want to make a moisturizing body wash with olive oil to help chase away winter dryness. If you're using polysorbate 80 to emulsify that oil, use non-paraben based preservative.

If you're interested in making a cream with titanium dioxide (say a liquid foundation) again the parabens are right out of the question because they can be deactivated by the pigments and the titanium dioxide.

And make sure you aren't using hydroxypropylmethyl cellulose to thicken your anionic systems - shampoo, body wash, face wash - when using something containing phenoxyethanol based preservatives like Optiphen, Optiphen ND, Phenonip, Liquipar Optima, or Liquipar PE.

If you're making anhydrous products you want to preserve - like sugar scrubs - you'll want to choose preservatives that are oil soluble, meaning the parabens like Phenonip and so on.

Here's the list of all the posts relating to preservatives, so you can choose the one that's best for you.

Cosmocil CQ
Geogard Ultra
Germaben II
Liquid Germall Plus
Liquipar Oil
Liquipar Optima
Liquipar PE
Optiphen
Optiphen ND
Optiphen Plus
Phenonip
Suttocide A
Tinosan SDC

And here's the link to the preservative chart download!