We’ve all heard of bars of soap, but what about lotion bars? It may sound like two words that don’t belong together, but these incredible little eco-friendly beauties are changing the way we moisturize!

Raise your hand if you’ve ever felt outraged by those tiny plastic bottles of lotion piling up half-empty in hotel rooms across the country. Or if you’ve ever cut open your lotion bottle to get to all the extra lotion sitting at the bottom. Or if you’ve ever scraped and prodded with the pump that can’t quite reach…

You get the picture! In our growing eco-friendly economy, we don’t like to waste. And plastic bottles for beauty products have been a source of distress for far too long. Plastic bottles of lotion, shampoo, conditioner, body wash, and other beauty products have done enough damage.

It’s easier than ever before to choose eco-friendly alternatives to the products we all grew up on. From top to toe, every product you use can be made better. And we don’t just mean better for the environment. We offer products that are better for you, too.

We only get one beautiful body in our lifetime. And we only get one Mother Earth. We can’t use them up and swap them out when we’re done. So, why not treat them both right? Our current favorite way to treat ourselves and the environment: zero-waste body lotion.

What is a Lotion Bar?

As the name suggests, a lotion bar is, well, a bar of lotion. It’s a zero-waste alternative to traditional plastic-bottle-based moisturizers. From the product itself to the packaging it’s shipped in, our lotion bar contains no plastic.

Rather than squeezing lotion out of a rigid and wasteful bottle, you rub the bar right on your skin when you need a boost of hydration. It may be different from what you’re used to, but we promise that it’s better, too!

We offer ONE option lotion bar. Made with organic ingredients that are better for you and the environment. They’re packaged the same way and offer similar benefits. Proudly recognized as the best lotion bar by Sustainable Jungle.

EcoRoots’ Zero-Waste Body Lotion – Lotion Bar Option For Moisturized Skin

 

Our balm bar is an all-over, daily rich moisturizer that keeps your skin smooth and hydrated. And because it’s made with better ingredients than the synthetics and fillers used in many traditional moisturizers, it’s also incredibly nourishing.

One of the primary ingredients, organic cocoa butter, is used to create a butter that is rich in antioxidants and nutrients. These healthy ingredients keep your skin hydrated, soft, and flexible. On top of it being a powerful and moisturizing antioxidant, cacao also has an incredible, light natural smell.

The overall scent of the balm bar is similar to chocolate without being overpowering. Its light and calming scent sticks around for a while but fades as it absorbs. Cacao is the star of this show, but it doesn’t act alone.

The shea butter in this balm bar helps calm the skin and reduce inflammation. And the jojoba seed oil helps balance our natural skin oils to promote healing and regeneration.

That’s right, in addition to smoothing, hydrating, and softening the skin daily, our lotion bar has actual healing properties. With continued use, you’ll see small wounds and scars begin to fade and heal. You can also use it on chapped lips, dry hair, and dry elbows!

EcoRoots’ Zero-Waste Body Lotion – Lotion Bar Plastic-Free Option

The lotion bar gently calm your senses while soothing and relaxing your skin. The raw shea butter is a moisturizing emollient, softening the skin and increasing flexibility. And the jojoba seed oil infuses with the other ingredients to calm and align the body and mind.

Just like the other bar, it also helps balance our natural oils to promote healing and regeneration. Whichever option you choose, you can’t go wrong with the benefits, the scent, or the reduced environmental impact!

Skin and Health Benefits of Our Zero-Waste Lotion

We mentioned each of these incredible skin and health benefits above, but they’re truly so astounding that we wanted to make them easier to find. Our organic balm bar:

• Has a fantastic, light scent.
• Is safe and effective for daily use.
• Keeps your skin hydrated, smooth, soft, and flexible.
• Is rich in antioxidants and healthy nutrients.
• Calms the skin and reduces inflammation.
• Helps balance natural skin oils to promote healing and regeneration.
• Heals and fades small wounds and scars.

Our zero-waste body lotion boasts a long list of benefits. It’s easy to see why our customers love it so much! Even our vegan customers can find no fault with our lotion bars. The vegan candellila wax contained in our lotion bars is wildcrafed and vegan.

An Easy Recipe for DIY Lotion

If you enjoy making things on your own before you commit to a long-term product change, we have an easy, eco-friendly, DIY lotion recipe to recommend! Here’s what you’ll need:

• ½ cup almond oil or jojoba oil.
• ¼ cup coconut oil.
• ¼ cup beeswax.
• One teaspoon vitamin E oil (optional.)
• Two tablespoons shea butter or cocoa butter (optional.)
• An essential oil of your choosing (optional.)
• Vanilla extract (optional.)

And here’s what to do with all of it:

• Combine the almond or jojoba oil, coconut oil, beeswax, and shea or cocoa butter in a double boiler. You could also mix it in a glass bowl on top of a simmering pan of water if you don’t have a double boiler.
• Stir the ingredients occasionally as they melt.
• When all ingredients are completely melted, add the vitamin E oil and any essential oils you like. Both of these ingredients are optional, but they will improve the end result. Vitamin E acts as an antioxidant, protecting cells from the damage caused by free radicals. And the essential oils are great for adding natural scents. We recommend peppermint, lavender, chamomile, eucalyptus, or tangerine.
• Skip the plastic pump and pour your zero-waste body lotion into a glass jar or tin for storage. Small mason jars are ideal, but the options are endless!

There you have it – an easy, eco-friendly, and homemade zero-waste lotion. Because it’s made with better ingredients, it’s ultra-moisturizing. This means that you can use less of this than you would of regular lotions.

Since these ingredients are shelf-stable and there’s no added water, this lotion has a longer shelf-life than other lotion recipes. For the best results, use your DIY lotion within six months of mixing it up. It won’t necessarily go bad, but its moisturizing benefits will be the most effective in this time frame.

According to its creator, Wellness Mama, this incredibly nourishing DIY lotion is also pretty versatile. It can be used as a regular moisturizer, but that’s not all. You can also use it to treat diaper rash and eczema or prevent stretch marks. You can also leave out the essential oils or use different ones to make it unisex.

How Do You Use a Lotion Bar?

If you’re looking for a reliable, eco-friendly, daily-use lotion bar, look no further. Ours is an excellent option for anyone on a mission to reduce their environmental impact and practice self-care at the same time. And using it is simple.

Here’s how to use your balm bar:

• Rub and massage the lotion bar freely on dry The balm bar reacts to your body heat and melts enough to spread easily, so additional moisture will make it less effective.
• Use it anywhere and anytime on your body, including your lips and hair if you choose.

That’s it! Just two simple steps and you have a whole new moisturizing routine.

Learn more about how to use a lotion bar in this article.

How to Store Your Zero-Waste Lotion

 

After each use, you could place your lotion bar on a soap dish or another safe, dry spot. But we recommend something better: our soap saver bag. Each soap saver bag is made of sustainable sisal, a 100% natural fiber that comes from the agave cactus family.

The bag will keep your zero-waste body lotion clean and dry so that it lasts longer and saves you money. And who doesn’t like saving money? You can also use our soap saver bags for your shampoo and conditioner bars.

This natural bag is perfect for gathering and using those little leftover bits and pieces of soap, too. It’s textured and easy on your skin, so it produces a generous, creamy, and rich lather when you add water and scrub with it. This makes it easier to exfoliate or massage your head, hands, or body, too.

And while the soap saver bag will make it last longer, you shouldn’t expect your lotion bar to last as long as a traditional lotion. It’s made with better stuff than that. Learn more about soap saver bag here. Everyone is different, but on average, when you use it every day and on your full body, each bar should last for about two months.

Why Should You Use a Lotion Bar?

Making the switch to lotion bars makes sense. We’ve already mentioned the many benefits for your skin and overall health. But what about the environmental impact? After all, that’s how you ended up here, isn’t it? Well, that answer is pretty compelling, too.

Using just one of our balm bars prevents at least four plastic lotion bottles from ending up in a landfill or ocean somewhere. And the organic ingredients break down faster and won’t damage the environment the way the ingredients in traditional lotions often do.

Traditional lotions often contain a wide range of harmful ingredients. And when we say harmful, we mean harmful for both you and the planet. You might be wondering how the chemicals, synthetics, and fillers in traditional lotions could harm the environment when they’re applied directly to the skin.

That’s a great question. And the answer is simple. Once plastic lotion bottles start to break down in a landfill somewhere, there is often some residue remaining and coating the inside. The residue or remaining lotion can seep into the ground to pollute the land or leak into our waterways.

This same concept applies to other plastic beauty bottles, too. Traditional shampoo, conditioner, body wash bottles, and others all operate the same way. They can stick around for decades, sometimes even hundreds of years, and continue to damage the environment long after you’ve discarded them.  

The Environmental Impact of Choosing Body Lotion Bars

So, we mentioned before that body lotion bars reduce your environmental impact by preventing four or more plastic lotion bottles from cluttering up another landfill or waterway. And by preventing unwanted ingredients from entering the environment after the bottles are empty. Now, let’s talk about a few more ways that they’re environmentally friendly.

On top of being plastic-free, each of our balm bars is compostable and comes in 100% reusable or upcyclable packaging. That’s right, your lotion bar comes packaged in a zero-waste refillable metal tin with a compostable paper bag.

The paper bag is an ideal alternative to single-use plastic wraps in the kitchen. It’s also handy for wrapping toiletries before traveling or in any other way you can think of. The wrap sticks to any surface with a gentle press of the hand. The warmth helps it to adhere.

To wash your metal tin, simply rinse in warm water and mild soap. Then, pat it dry completely or hang it up to dry after each use. When it reaches the end of its usability, you can cut the paper bag it into small pieces and compost it at home or a local composting facility. Also don't forget to recycle the metal tin with metal recycling or reuse it.

Other Zero-Waste Body Lotion Alternatives

If our body lotion bar seems close to what you’re looking for but not quite right, we’ve got a full lineup of other zero-waste body lotion alternatives for you to browse! Our favorites are our:

• Yay for Earth Lotion
• Shea butter cream
• Rosehip Face Cream
• Zero-waste facial moisturizer
• Pumpkin Enzyme Mask
• Exfoliating body scrub

We recommend pairing them up based on your unique skin type and beauty goals. Most people prefer using a separate moisturizer on the face, so we provide one that is specifically designed to improve the sensitive skin that houses your rosy cheeks and delicate eyes.

The exfoliating body scrub is also a must with any of the others. It helps smooth away rough, dead skin cells to leave you glowing and feeling and looking refreshed. Most experts recommend exfoliating twice per week.

But your skincare routine wouldn’t be complete without rehydrating after you exfoliate. And that’s where our lotion alternatives come in. Whether you choose the body bar, vegan body cream, shea butter cream, or aloe vera lotion, the results are impressive, and the environmental impact is minimal.

Vegan Lotion Balm

Our zero-waste lotion nourishes your skin from head to toe. This ultra-hydrating, super-rich body lotion helps nourish and protect the skin with a unique blend of calming and wholesome ingredients, including:

• Olive Oil
• Calendula
• Jojoba Oil
• The anti-inflammatory extract of Mango Butter

With its anti-inflammatory properties, it not only hydrates, nourishes, and protects, but also reduces inflammation and redness. This incredible combination of benefits will leave your skin feeling soft, smooth, and supple.

Its gentle blend of sustainable ingredients makes it safe and suitable for all skin types. This vegan lotion is also cruelty-free, vegan, palm-oil-free, and plastic-free. And it comes in a decorative reusable glass jar with an aluminum lid.

You can keep it for storage or recycle it once it’s empty. Like our other incredible beauty products, it’s good for you and good for the planet!

Shea Butter Cream

There are three options for our shea butter cream:

• Dermatological strength shea butter.
• Unscented everyday shea butter balm.
• Lavender scented everyday shea butter balm.

This amazing zero-waste moisturizer soothes your skin and keeps your pores from becoming congested. Each option is made from a sustainably sourced blend of all-natural ingredients. The highly concentrated formula makes it ideal for rough skin and dry spots.

With vitamins A, E, F, and K, this shea butter cream rejuvenates and moisturizes. It’ll leave your skin feeling smoother and looking better longer. If you’re prone to dry skin, this intensive moisturizing option may be your best bet.

It also wells well in treating and preventing several other skin, health, and beauty concerns, including:

• Soothing psoriasis and eczema.
• Preventing stretch marks.
• Deeply hydrating the body, hands, feet, and face without clogging your pores.

But we’re still not done just yet. You can also use it as a conditioning hair mask or a natural makeup removal method. The decorative zero-waste aluminum tin is perfect for moisturizing on the go and upcycling once it’s empty. A small amount goes a long way, so the full jar usually lasts for several months.  

Rosehip Cream

Our Rosehip Cream is unscented and has a light consistency, which makes it ideal for sensitive skin. It can be used on both the body and face. The rosehip in it hydrates while the hibiscus flower extract holds in the moisture and protects the skin.

This unique combination makes it an effective year-round moisturizer. It also containers rosehip oil extract, which is rich in oleic acid and high in vitamins A, C, and E. These ingredients nourish dry and damaged skin.

Use it to soothe sunburnt skin or hydrate chapped cheeks and hands. A little bit goes a long way, and it has many different uses. From summer to winter, you’ll have everything you need to keep your skin hydrated, happy, and smooth.

We always makes products with natural ingredients. We don’t dabble in chemicals or synthetic ingredients that lengthen the life of their products but poison our bodies and the environment.

To achieve the best results, we recommend using the zero waste moisturizer within four months. You can also keep it in the fridge to lengthen its shelf life to six months. Like the products that came before it, this rosehip lotion is cruelty-free, vegan, organic, plastic-free, and contained in a recyclable or upcyclable jar.

Zero-Waste Facial Moisturizer

Last but not least on our zero-waste body lotion alternative list is our zero-waste facial moisturizer. Treat your skin with this incredible moisturizer made with argan powder repurposed from argan shells.

This face moisturizer is deeply hydrating and fast absorbing for nourished and bright skin. Because it’s made with healthy ingredients like cocoa butter, aloe vera, and blood orange, it’s a moisturizer suitable for all skin types and complexions.

Cocoa butter is a powerful anti-inflammatory, effortlessly soothing redness and irritation. This ingredient is particularly beneficial for those with psoriasis, eczema, or prone to rashes. Aloe vera is a potent antioxidant that is also rich in vitamins A and C. These ingredients help calm and repair damaged, inflamed, or dry skin.

Lastly, blood orange is high in anthocyanins, which also help fight inflammation. Nobody likes walking around with puffy eyes and irritated cheeks. Thankfully, this deeply hydrating, nourishing, and soothing moisturizer will help even out your complexion.  

And on top of all of these incredible benefits, it’s also gentle enough for twice-daily use. We recommend waking up with it in the morning and refreshing with it before bed. But you can simply apply it to clean, dry skin whenever you choose.

Like our other moisturizer options, this zero waste face moisturizer is cruelty-free, plastic-free, and 100% recyclable or upcyclable. That last one is important to us. Reusing, repurposing, and re-loving is a major component of the eco-friendly movement. 

This decorative jar and its aluminum lid can easily be used for storage once empty. Use it to collect your hair ties, organic reusable cotton rounds, bobby pins, or other small beauty supplies or accessories. If you don’t have any use for it, just recycle it when you’re done instead!

Pumpkin Enzyme Mask

Our Pumpkin Peel with Glycolic Acid and fruits enzymes, helps get rid of the build-up and superficial pore congestion within 5-10 minutes, while nourishing the skin with vitamins and fruit extract. This delicious Pumpkin Enzyme Mask creates an invigorating sensation when applied on the skin. After removing the mask, your skin will feel steam-cleaned, soft and glowing! Can be used on the face, or entire body!

Exfoliating Body Scrub

 

Our organic exfoliating body scrub is the ultimate item in eco-friendly self-care. We recommend picking this one up regardless of which other products you choose. This plant-based and vegan exfoliant is subtly scented with tangerine oil, which gently refreshes.

It’s even gentle enough to use on your face. That’s what healthier ingredients can do for our beauty products! The scent of this body scrub is light enough to be unisex, and the product itself is gentle enough to use daily. Available in three options: Coconut, Peppermint & Turmeric Grapefruit!

However, most experts recommend using an exfoliating scrub twice per week. All you need to do to slough off dry skin and reveal the refreshed layer underneath is:

• With dry fingers, scoop up enough to cover the desired area.
• Massage onto damp skin for light exfoliation.
• Massage onto dry skin for a deeper scrub.

For the smoothest, silkiest, and most comfortable skin you’ve ever experienced, use our exfoliating body scrub alongside our safety razor, organic body soap, turmeric body scrub and organic shaving soap. You’ll never want to go back to your old shaving routine!

The safety razor brings us back to the good old days with a plastic-free and super close shave. And with our organic shaving soap, you can say goodbye to itchy skin and bumps. Its delicious mix of citrus and lavender notes is enriched with shea butter and cocoa butter.

This combination provides a lovely fragranced and foamy treat for your skin that also helps reduce plastic waste! When you choose products that are better for you and better for the planet, everyone wins.

Building Better Habits with EcoRoots

 

EcoRoots isn’t a one-and-done type of company. We don’t just offer a product or a service. We help our customers build new lifestyles. We inform, inspire, and provide full lineups of incredible eco-friendly products.

From bath and beauty to home and kitchen, our zero-waste products help you create routines that you can be proud of. Keep your eye on our new arrivals page to be the first to know about our incredible products as they come in.

And revisit our zero-waste blog page often to stay informed on how our products compare to traditional ones, how to use them, why you should, the difference you can make, and more. For example, check this blog about natural loofah. We care about our customers and our planet. That’s why we go beyond providing products.

As a brand built on community, we also love to give back. EcoRoots donates a percentage of our annual sales toward sustainability initiatives and organizations that give back to this planet of ours, including Ocean Conservancy.

So, why choose to build an eco-friendly lifestyle and home? Because the future is low-waste. We are happy to have you on this journey with us!