20/09/2022
From Rachel's HAN post
SEED TO SEAL
There is SO much information out there explaining the difference between therapeutic grade essential oils and all of the other oils out there on the market, which is better than the other, etc. It gets hard to filter, and I often feel like the things I am reading are written by people with an agenda! Here is a brief breakdown of why I believe Young Living is a cut above… This lengthy, but bear with me because I think it’s important!
Let’s talk the oil industry first:
1. 95% of oils out there on the market are not therapeutic grade, but rather produced for the food and fragrance industry. Companies are cutting corners on production to try to produce more oils, and the methods they are using are either releasing toxins into the oil or destroying some of the important compounds necessary in therapeutic grade oils. YL is intentional about their harvesting and distillation process.
2. “100% pure” doesn’t necessarily mean that it will have therapeutic properties. When a company says its oils are “pure” that only means that the oil does not contain some other essential oil. The question of whether or not the essential oil is tainted with chemicals or solvents is not even considered. Legally, only 5% of what’s in that bottle has to be the actual essential oil. That’s how companies are selling these oils at such reduced prices! Unfortunately, when it comes to essential oils, you really do get what you pay for.
3.. Even if an oil is truly 100% pure and organic, you want to be sure that the oils were harvested and distilled correctly! Companies will distill a plant more than once to get as much oil as possible out of a plant which allows for more quantity, but produces a poorer quality oil. Think about making coffee with grounds that have already been filtered once! Nobody wants that second pot of coffee! And mixing the first and second pots of coffee taints the whole batch! It's the same with oils. Also, you have no clue about if those plants were harvested at the appropriate time or distilled long enough to get all of the therapeutic goodness out of the plant. If you are wanting to buy oils for therapeutic purposes, it is VERY important to be aware of how intentional a company is in their process! They should be publishing their standards. Transparency is key!
Now about Young Living:
When we're buying food from the store, isn't it great to know where it’s coming from? Young Living has a Seed to Seal guarantee that is unmatched and I love the fact that they are involved in the entire process from choosing the little tiny seed to distilling and bottling the oils.
1. Young Living is the industry standard. They have been around for more than 20 years and to me that says something! They have had time to grow, to refine their processes, make mistakes, and then learn from them and get better!
2. They have had the time and the resources to find out what levels key chemicals in each oil need to be at to maximize the therapeutic properties. It was important to them to make the most effective therapeutic oils possible, and they follow through! They have had the time and funding to do the research to know when to harvest a plant to get those chemicals within that range in the oil.
3. Young Living is as transparent as they come. You can visit any farm and actually see the growing process, how they harvest the plants, and how they distill and bottle the oils. This keeps them honest. Transparency is key for me when it comes to picking an essential oil company.
4. They are committed to a certain level of quality and refuse to compromise in this category. If this means they have to allow an oil to be out of stock for a while until they can get a crop that meets their standards, they will make that sacrifice. It’s worth it to them not to compromise quality!
5. Over time, other companies have sprouted and provided some competition in the essential oil world. To me competition is a good thing! It makes everybody step up their game to try to edge out the competition. It drives prices down, and who wouldn't be happy about that? I believe that competing companies have allowed YL to step up their game even more. They have the largest essential product line in the industry, and their quality, purity, and effectiveness are unmatched.
6. They have a Seed to Seal guarantee. Check out the Seed to Seal website to see firsthand how intentional Young Living is with their process in harvesting these oils! Young living has a series of videos on www.seedtoseal.com which explain firsthand how intentional they are about this process! The “Seed” video is one of my favorites! Young Living’s commitment to quality means that even if they have to allow an oil to go out of stock for a while until they can get a crop that meets their stringent standards, they will make that sacrifice and do it!
https://www.youngliving.com/en_US/discover/seed-to-seal
This short video explains a bit more about the Seed to Seal Process and Young Living’s commitment to quality:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLQuvo1hxpo
