Dishwash Powder is so great

Another happy customer :)


"Hey the dishwasher powder is so great. I'll certainly be ordering that off you for LIFE hahahaha so when im on the last one, i'll send through another request for a couple of them again. And will do for quite sometime. Even if my son's skin cleared up, theres no way i'd go back to a chemical house. So thanks heaps. What a great discovery".

I replied to my happy customer saying that it may be quite some time before they order more as 2 kg of Earthwise Dishwash Powder will take a very long time to get through, as you only need a Tablespoon for each wash.

A little goes a long way with natural chemical free products. Thanks for the great feedback xx

Skin Irritants - very irritating

There are several ingredeints in skin care products that may irritate our skin and cause dryness, redness, itchiness and/or inflammation.

Keep an eye out for the following synthetic nasties which are known skin irritants:

Sodium Lauryl Suplphate - used to froth many products such as shampoos, shower gels, toothpastes, etc. It is a known irritant and only used in products that are immediately washed off the skin. Can damage the protective outer layer of the skin and is absorbed deeply within the skin tissue. Has a very drying effect on the skin.

Petrolatum Products such as mineral oils and petroleum jelly - these cover the skin in a layer like glad wrap, so the skin can't breath or function properly. This often casues the skin to then dry and crack.

Fragrances - 50-200 ingredients in a single fragrance, the second biggest group of skin allergens

Chemical Preservatives - parabens are one of the primary causes of contact dermatitis

These are all well known skin irritants yet are still allowed to be used as ingredients in products that are readily avaliable, are cheap and are used on our bodies several times a day.

Look at your ingredient lists of your everyday products and avoid these, for the health of your skin. Choose a more natural body product and your skin and body will thank you.

Visit the fantastic Skin Deep website and find out more about any ingredient in your body care products and assess yourself how safe it really is.

Free Facial Mist

Get a Free Herb Farm Rejuvinating Facial Mist with every Energising Gel Cleanser during September. The perfect combo to cleanse and tone. Or a spray during the day to freshen your skin.

Free of chemicals, all natural ingredients. Get your Free Facial Mist when you order your Herb Farm Gel Cleanser (125mls $20) at Red Rata.

Congratulations to the lucky Green Goddess winner

Congratulations to Glynis from Auckland who won the Red Rata prize pack from the competition on Wendyl's great Green Goddess website. Yes all of our products are made in New Zealand by many wonderful caring and health conscious companies.

I hope you enjoy all the goodies in this pack Glynis.

And a big thank you to everyone who entered. I hope you all enjoy finding out more about the fantastic natural products that we have at Red Rata and I look forward to finding just the right natural home and body care goodies for you.

Best wishes to you all.

So many bubbles!!

I really love hearing from happy customers and this email made me smile:

"Thank you so much Susan – our bubbles arrived today and for the first time in a very long time I did not have to entice my daughter to get into the bath, as soon as she saw the bubbles she jumped right in.

As for the bath, it looked so inviting I jumped in with her in the end. It was great, I feel so relaxed and warm.

Also I was quite surprised at the amount of bubbles, even having seen the photo you had posted on your website – a really great product. Thanks again."

Another happy customer who loves Herbal Selections natural bubble bath, enjoy the bubbles but without the chemicals. :-)

Green Goddess Prize Pack

HI to all of Green Goddess's newsletter subscribers who are in the draw to win a wonderful prize pack from Red Rata. Thanks for entering and welcome to Red Rata. I hope you enjoy visiting Red Rata's website and checking out our fantastic range of natural body and home care products. Our aim is to offer you the best choices in chemical free products, all tried, tested and chosen by my family and I.

Follow us on Facebook as well to keep right up with what is happening.

You may be wondering what you are in to win so here is what's in the prize pack...

The Herb Farm Citrus Body Lotion 100ml

Clean Earth Soaps Manuka Honey & Calendul 85g

Red Seal Sodium Lauryl Sulphate Free Herbal and Mineral Toothpaste

Earthwise Citrus Air Freshener 250ml

AND Tui Bug Balme 50g

A little bit of everthing for everything. A great pack to receive if you were just wanting to try out a range of natural products, or needed stocking up on the essentials.

Good luck to all of you who have entered. Watch out for Wendyl's Green Goddess newsletter next Thursday where the winner will be announced.

Are natural products natural??

A recent article in the Consumer magazine (Issue 505) tested several supposedly 'natural' cosmetics and found the majority are not living up to their claims. I find this shocking, although not surprising. Many products propose they are natural or organic but may only contain a small amount of such a product and the rest is synthetic chemicals.

Consumer tested 18 'natural' cosmetics, only some made in NZ, such as eye creams, face creams, body moisturisers, nipple creams, bodywashes, deodorant. They tested these products for synthetic perservatives and found only TWO did not use synthetic chemicals to prolong the shelf life of their products!!!

Parabens are a common preservative in cosmetics but there is concern as to their toxicity. So avoid anything saying methyl, butyl, proply or ethyl.

Many of the products tested by Consumer had phenoxyethanol in them which also has questions raised about its safety. The Cosmetic Database gives it a moderate hazard rating, with links to skin irritation and immunotoxicity, and restrictions as to its use. Avoid this in your products too.

Good news is that there are cosmetics out there that are made with natural chemcial-free preservatives which pose less of a risk to your health. Red Rata is really proud to only sell products that have natural preservatives in them, and they are all made here in New Zealand by some fantastic companies.

The Herb Farm uses a combination of herbal extracts, essential oils and colloidial silver as their natural preservative. Earthwise use sea salt and essentials oils. Essence use grapefruit seed extract in their products that contain water.

The best thing you can do is learn to read the ingredient lists on the products you use. If you cannot read the word, it is likely to be out of a chemistry lab. If it looks Latin, it is probably plant derived and usually the better option. Get wise, be informed and choose the safest products for you and your family. Don't beleive what the pretty labels on the bottle tell you, read the ingredients.

Visit Red Rata to check out our range and find out more information about a wide range of New Zealand made natural body and home care products. Treat your body to the care it deserves.