The quality of the herbal and tea rinses you’re making will largely depend on the ingredients you use to come up with the mixture. No matter how well you steep the herbs or how you prepare the teas, it won’t be as effective if your ingredients aren’t at their best.
How would you know if the tea or herb you’re using is ideal for a hair rinse? Where should you buy them to be assured that you’re getting the best quality?
The answers will be found in this chapter.
Basically, there are two ways on how you can have herbs and teas on hand: order herbs online, or purchase them on supermarkets and grocery stores.
Which option is better?
Each option would have its own advantages and disadvantages; see which one suits your needs better.
Grocery Stores. The grocery store’s number one offering is convenience. After paying for the herb or tea, then it’s yours to take home whether to add into your recipes or to mix in your organic rinses. You can go ahead and clean your hair with whatever concoction you wish to come up with.
Here’s the “bad” part: their prices are way higher compared to online stores. Research actually shows that groceries’ prices can be 3 to 20 times higher, so you might as well buy online – you’ll probably get it cheaper even with shipping.
Online Stores. With the previous statements in mind, prices of herbs and teas on online stores are significantly cheaper. Sage, for example, can be bought online for about 76 cents, but can be bought at the grocery store for $16 an ounce.
What’s the drawback with online stores? With online stores, you’d still have to wait before you can have the ingredients on hand. If you’re lucky, you’d get it in a day or two, but for some, the waiting can last a week.
Plus, to grab the best deals, you might have to buy in bulk to make the most of the shipping fees. That means you’d end up with lots of herbs that will last you a few weeks or so.
So what’s the verdict? If you need the herbs at this very minute and if you don’t need a lot, then it might not hurt to buy at grocery stores for now. But if you see yourself using these herbs for a long time and that you’re going to need a lot, then buy at online stores instead – a few days won’t hurt if it means you’d have more herbs to use for your rinses.
There are a lot of stores selling herbs and teas online. It’s close to impossible to mention them all, but here are some of them that’s highly recommended.
Companion Plants (companionplants.com)
This is a site for an herb nursery established since 1982. They offer around 600 kinds of both common and exotic herb varieties, and they provide herbs of different purposes – medicinal, culinary, cosmetic, etc. Selections are sorted to make shopping easy and pleasurable for you.
If you wish to see their plants yourself, you can check out their physical store – actually their greenhouse – at Athens, OH wherein you can see these herbs for yourself. They ship anywhere in the country and make sure that your plants arrive at your doorstep safe and sound.
Mountain Valley Growers (mountainvalleygrowers.com)
Mountain Valley Growers started with 7 varieties in 1983, and grew to supplying around 400 varieties in 2002. This company is certified organic by the USDA, and aside from herbs, they also sell vegetable plants and flowers.
Aside from offering plants, they also help plant shoppers by including botanical name cross-referencing, plus have herb quick reference pages. By doing so, you’ll be sure that you’re buying what you really need. They also have social media pages to ensure they’ll always be in touch with potential and existing customers.
Strictly Medicinal Seeds (strictlymedicinalseeds.com)
Strictly Medicinal Seeds has a wide variety of plants for you. Their name might have ‘seeds’ on it, but don’t be fooled – they have not only seeds, but plants of different shapes and sizes. They have herbs and extracts, live roots, trees and shrubs.
That’s not all; they also have books and DVDs sold here if you need more education or if you wish to grow these plants yourselves. On that note, they also offer screens and other gardening supplies.
Richters (richters.com)
This site also offers a huge herb selection – they offer every type of herb plus their different varieties. A catalog is found on the site and is updated annually; you can check the catalog for the list of herbs they offer and see those ones available for pre-order or those on-hand. This helps you make an informed decision whenever you buy from them.
Richters hopes to help not only those casual buyers, but also those who rely on herbs for a living e.g. those who make herbal products or those in the herb business. They also have a gift shop and greenhouses located in Toronto; you can also check those out if you happen to be in the area.
As previously discussed, finding quality tea could be difficult in a sense that you can’t initially taste what you’re paying for, unless you’ve already tried it out before.
To make online tea shopping easier, here are some of the quality tea stores.
Teavivre (teavivre.com)
This online tea store’s specialty is Chinese tea. They only carry Chinese tea inside their store, but the ones they have are of good quality and quite incomparable. They also offer different kinds of pu-erh teas and often provide sales and discounts, which is good for those who are just beginners to this tea variety.
Their website may be quite simple, but you’ll see how their simplicity gets the job done. The teas are grouped according to their types so you won’t be lost in searching for what you need. You can also find tea sets and accessories to complete your tea experience.
Rishi (rishi-tea.com)
Rishi offers a wide variety of tea types; they’re sure to provide the kind of tea you require. Aside from selling straight tea, Rishi also has teabags and blends. They may look like a big shop, but their tea offerings are of good quality.
There are Rishi teas that can be found on supermarkets, so you can try one out first and see the quality for yourself. Their teas have the USDA Organic logo and are free of genetically modified organisms (GMOs). To add, Rishi Tea products don’t have ingredients that have dairy or gluten, and even follow strict control procedures for allergens.
Red Blossom Tea (redblossomtea.com)
The teas from the Red Blossom Tea Company are sourced from different growers and artisans in China and Taiwan. They conduct annual buying trips that happen the same as the Spring tea harvest.
The company admits that it could have been easier to buy through distributors or large markets but they believe that the effort they spend will lead to high quality teas as well as teawares. After 30 years of carefully selecting their tea, they have set high expectations within themselves and hope to always provide flavorful products.
Fang Gourmet Tea (fangtea.com)
This New York tea shop is said to offer one of the finest tea-tasting experiences in the area – they focus on blacks, Pu-erh and oolong teas from Taiwan and China. Their website may not be as updated, but customers can always talk to the company staff over the phone to ask what kind of teas they have on stock.
Aside from offering quality tea, they also have tea accessories to give you the complete tea-drinking experience. Want to try something new? They have pomelo tea, a rare specialty made when a pomelo is hollowed out, stuffed with tea leaves and aged prior to brewing.
In Pursuit of Tea (inpursuitoftea.com)
This company is one of those that has a wide range of tea varieties but does not compromise quality. It has been around since 2001, and their tea offerings have spanned from Himalayan to Japanese, to Chinese tea that have focused on Pu-erh and oolong teas.
In Pursuit of Tea believes that they should offer teas with natural aromas and flavors. The company looks for “true teas” and ensures they won’t be mixed with ingredients of inferior quality. Their teas are not blended, that’s why they maintain their complexity and diversity.
Everlasting Teas (everlastingteas.com)
The company was established in 2011 with the intent of bringing you loose leaf tea from Taiwanese farms. They don’t just import tea – they go straight to specific individuals who have raised tea for generations.
Everlasting Tea has four main tea types: green, white, black and oolong. Their shop does not only have aged tea, but they also have younger teas that are also worth trying.
Crimson Lotus Tea (crimsonlotustea.com)
Crimson Lotus Tea specializes in pu-erh tea, as well as tea wares and tea education. Their teas come from Yunnan, while their company is based in Seattle. The company is owned by a couple who never thought they’ll be in the tea business (the owner was first a coffee lover) but now is so obsessed about it.
The company is mainly about one-of-a-kind pu-erh teas, and they aim to attract the new tea drinkers. Every year, they go to Yunnan, China to be as close to their tea source as they can.
Whether you’ll choose to buy your herbs and teas online or at a physical store will be solely up to you – go for whichever is more suitable for your needs. What’s important is to have the herbs and teas that you need for your herbal and tea rinses.