Reuse old soap bars by using any of the following 3 methods. I’ve used all three and it depends on if you already have some soap supplies, how much time and effort you have, and how much money you have. Let’s go in order of easy, lol.
3 great ways to reuse old soap bars
#1 – the soap saver bag:
Easier than making soap and you get every cent out of your soap. These little bags can be found in various places such as Amazon.com or farmers markets. If you aren’t the sewing and knitting type, find someone to make you one! The prices seem to start at around $4.00, which is decent. It’s also one of those purchases that will pay for itself – eventually. Oh, make sure they use soft yarn or that you buy one made with soft material, unless you like scratchy or scrubby cloths.
The soap saver bag like below sell for around $4:
Or you could make one, or get someone else too. Knitters love to make things that people want, perfect little soap saver bag below. Homemade ones also sell for about $4 each:
#2 – second option, no costs, just time
I did this just a little while ago. You just grate up, or chop, all the soap pieces you have into a pot. I also added a couple bars of soaps with scents that I wasn’t thrilled about, so I could make a newly scented bar. You will need to add water as you go and don’t stir like crazy or your melting soap will bubble too much. I added rose fragrance oil to mine, but no new colors. I put every scrap I had and wasn’t trying to color coordinate with anything.
To melt and re-use old soap pieces into new soap:
- grate all soap pieces
- put in regular pot with water
- on low-medium heat, solften the pieces and gently stir
- pieces will soften and turn into a hard slurry
- made need more water
- this melted base will be a little hard to stir
- add your new scent and/or a color to brighten it up
Now you can roll this new soap into balls and let cool for a couple of weeks. Base will be warm-hot, so wear gloves. Wash pot asap as the soap will harden. Image below shows some soap balls:
Or you can plop the new soap base into a mold and later cut into bars. I have done this method myself, easy to do, and will look similar to the mottled-looking soap in the following image:
#3 – third option, requires a new soap base:
and adding your leftover soap pieces. We did this at our store, even separated the colors so we could add the like-colored pieces to complimentary scented soaps. The image above shows 2 bars done like this, the bars with the white base that is visible.
Below are images from very creative people, making some very beautiful bars. This first image would be from a white soap base with the leftover pieces cut into chunks or slivers of different colored soap:
This image shows what can be done with colorful grated soap into a nice bright complimentary soap base:
I had a few types of bars where I used leftover pieces, there are more example of bars here, on this page.
Any of these ways to reuse old soap bars will still save you lots of money over buying more natural soap. It is also much healthier to reuse these than to buy any store brands. And its nice just to be on top of saving money as well as being creative.
Here is a great article on how sales of bars soaps are going down while liquid soaps are going up. Of course what most people (except us here) do not know that liquid soaps are created with chemical bubbling agents – not actual soap. And, duh, soap is self cleaning!
#handmadesoap #naturalsoap #indigoearthnews #soapmaking #soapmaking #soaps #artisansoap #bathandbody #cpsoap #coldprocesssoap #etsy #soapbase #soapcrafter #soapmaker #soaping #soapcrafting #soaphandmade #soap #giftidea #christmas #barsoap #handmadesoap #natural #organic #skincare #coldprocess