North Wolf Beauty Quality Control Practices

North Wolf Beauty’s quality control process for handcrafted soaps and related skin and hair care products ensures that each product meets high safety, efficacy, and consistency standards. Here’s a comprehensive quality control process tailored for handcrafted skincare and haircare products:

Raw Material Inspection:

1. Source raw materials from reputable suppliers known for quality and consistency.  We always strive for the best product with fair trade for its producers, gatherers, and workers.
2. Conduct thorough inspections upon receipt of raw materials to ensure they meet specifications and are free from contaminants, impurities, or damage.
3. Maintain detailed records of raw material batches for traceability and quality assurance purposes.  All formulations have their batches labeled with date, ingredient reference, and name.  They are inspected periodically to ensure the final product you receive is as great as it was when produced.
4. Formulation and Recipe Standardization. This is a process of achieving the desired result and sticking to the formula every single time. If the formula is not exactly as the desired outcome, adjustments are made, and documented, and another session of trial and error and product testing is done.
5. Develop standardized formulations and recipes for each product, specifying precise ingredient quantities and manufacturing procedures.  Again, sticking with what we know works, how it works, why it works, and what it improves in our bodies.
6. Document formulations accurately, including ingredient lists, proportions, and production instructions.  Notes along with formulations are carefully written, stored, and referenced.
7. We regularly review and update formulations based on ingredient availability, regulatory requirements, and customer feedback. We practice the Guidlines of Manufacturers of Cosmetic Products (December 2022) as well as all other USA regulatory compliance regulations.  We strive to achieve the EU standards of quality, as they provide a clearer and more strict compliance with industry standards around the world.

Manufacturing Process Control:

1. Implement standardized manufacturing processes and operating procedures to ensure product consistency and reproducibility.
2. Train staff thoroughly on manufacturing protocols, equipment operation, and hygiene practices to minimize errors and contamination risks.
3. Monitor critical process parameters such as temperature (I always use a heat gun thermometer in all my soapmaking process steps, and in final products of lotions, body washes, and shampoos with Product Testing *see attached for each one to make sure they are skin safe and appealing I try to keep my pH *as close to 7 as possible except certain cleansers that only work great with higher pH), mixing times, and an all-natural preservative to maintain product integrity and quality. The article on the NCBI website discusses the pH of skin and how it relates to soap and cleansers. It highlights the importance of skin’s natural acidic pH, which typically ranges from 4 to 6, and acts as a protective barrier. Alkaline soaps, which have higher pH levels, can disrupt this barrier, leading to issues like dryness, irritation, and infections. Testing soap pH ensures it remains within a skin-friendly range, maintaining skin health and avoiding potential damage.  For more details, you can view the article here.
4. We keep key concepts of chemistry in mind:  Elements: Pure substances that consist of only one type of atom, found on the periodic table (e.g., hydrogen, oxygen). Compounds: Substances made from two or more different elements chemically bonded (e.g., H₂O, CO₂). Mixtures: Combinations of substances that aren’t chemically bonded (e.g., air, saltwater). Solutions: A type of mixture where one substance (solute) is dissolved in another (solvent).  Chemical Reactions: Processes where substances change into new products.  Acids/Bases: Substances with specific pH ranges that affect reactions.  Understanding these helps explain how matter interacts and transforms in nature.
5. We keep updated references and study ancient as well as current trends in biology, especially plant and animal matter:  Understanding plant biology is essential for cosmetic chemistry because plants are a primary source of ingredients in skincare and beauty products. Here are some basics:

1. Phytochemicals: These are active compounds found in plants (e.g., flavonoids, antioxidants) that benefit skin health.  We study peer-reviewed scientific journals, as well as listen and learn from our elders on what is effective for such things as antioxidants, and calming chemicals such as hop cone as researched by the National Library of Medicine, and studies done at Stanford that show we have chemicals in our brain that are similar in effect to marijuana, and Harvard (I have two aunties who earned their PhD’s from Harvard, and I have been to MIT, living in Cambridge the summer I was 17), and I love all things scientific or generational knowledge passed down.  I have studied AI in my Master’s degree as well, which was achieved in 2005.  It’s been a long time since then, and AI has come into full force now.
2. Extraction Methods: Techniques like cold pressing and distillation are used to extract oils and essences from plants. We have begun the process of extracting our essential oils and hydrosols from local plants.  These are a continuous process of understanding if we can achieve the same or better results than what we out-source.
3. Botanical Oils & Extracts: Ingredients like aloe vera, rosehip oil, or chamomile have soothing, moisturizing, and healing properties.  To see the list of additives I use, click on this article https://northwolfluxury.com/botanicals-oil-and-additives-we-use/
4. Photosynthesis: Provides the energy plants need, helping them produce beneficial compounds for cosmetics.  To us specifically, it refers to which point in their life cycle we gather and extract.
5. Natural vs Synthetic: Plant-based ingredients can sometimes be gentler on the skin compared to synthetic chemicals.  We study the synthetic variations that either enhance, provide acceleration of the end product, or preserve the product.
6. We keep informed of the cyclical nature of our area by listening to the Phenology Report on radio station KAXE from Grand Rapids, MN which has been live on the radio for over 40 years!.  As we are northern Minnesota-based, we try to use as many locally sourced resources in our products as we can and get outside and experience the science behind God’s wonderful creations.
7. We conduct routine equipment maintenance and calibration to ensure accuracy and reliability. I studied chemistry in college, understand the basics of the Table of Elements, proper calibration methods and concepts, and now intensely study applications and pH adjustment.

In-process Quality Checks:

1. Perform in-process quality checks at various stages of production to identify and rectify deviations from specifications promptly.
2. Inspect product appearance, texture, scent, and color to ensure each product meets aesthetic and sensory requirements.
3. Conduct quality tests, such as pH measurement, viscosity analysis, and microbial testing, to verify product safety and stability.
4. Record observations and test results accurately for documentation and analysis.

Finished Product Inspection:

1. Conduct comprehensive inspections of finished products before packaging to confirm compliance with quality standards.
2. Evaluate product attributes such as appearance, texture, fragrance, pH, stability, and microbial content.
3. Randomly select samples from each batch for third-party laboratory testing to validate safety, efficacy, and regulatory compliance.
4. Reject or quarantine products that fail to meet quality criteria and investigate root causes to prevent recurrence. Do things go unexpectedly? YES. In making my soap bars, high temperature-hot process as great grandma Mary passed down, I rarely encountered that. However, I recently had this gaffe at my last event– I noticed my new body wash which smelled so wonderful, and I thought had turned out, had separated.  So the formulation had to be re-emulsified.  How?  The product had to be removed from the packaging, and heated, and new emulsion and stabilizer had to be added and re-cooked and kept from sale to see if corrections were effective.

Packaging and Labeling Compliance:

1. Ensure packaging materials are clean, intact, and suitable for the intended product.
2. Verify the accuracy and completeness of product labels, including ingredient lists, warnings, instructions, and batch codes.
3. Implement tamper-evident seals and security measures to prevent contamination or adulteration during storage and transit.
4. Adhere to regulatory requirements and industry standards for packaging, labeling, and product claims.
5. Documentation and Recordkeeping:
   1. Maintain detailed records of quality control activities, including batch records, test results, inspection logs, and corrective actions taken.
   2. Establish a robust document control system to manage revisions, approvals, and archival of quality-related documents.
6. Retain samples from each batch for traceability and reference purposes, as well as for stability testing and customer inquiries.

Continuous Improvement and Feedback Loop:

1. Regularly review quality control processes and performance metrics to identify opportunities for improvement.
2. Provide extensive employee training on safety, PPE, documentation, formulations, soap art techniques, hygiene and sanitation, training on equipment and raw materials, packaging, quality testing, waste management, energy efficiency, and standard operating procedures for all products they may be creating or assisting in all areas from research to productuction, and sales.
3. Encourage feedback from customers, employees, and stakeholders to identify potential issues or areas for enhancement.
4. Implement corrective and preventive actions (CAPAs) based on root cause analysis to address quality deviations and prevent recurrence.
5. Foster a culture of quality consciousness and continuous learning among employees through training, communication, and recognition.
6. By implementing an effective quality control process encompassing these key elements, handcrafted soap, and skincare manufacturers can consistently deliver safe, high-quality products that meet customer expectations and regulatory requirements.