The Shield Series
You’re an athlete.
Your life motto is “I’m comfortable being uncomfortable.”
However, that doesn’t mean that you have to purposely suffer.
Picking up nasty fungus and bacteria other athletes have left behind at the gym is not part of your job.
That’s why we designed the shield series to protect you.
Our soap helps wash away common fungus and bacteria found at the gym using essential oils with antifungal properties.
The Villains
The Tinea Family
The Tinea family of skin infections is crime syndicate of fungul infections. They want to take over the neighborhood and spread to the next one over if they get the chance.
Jock’s Itch
Athlete’s Foot
Ringworm
Ringworm (Tinea Corporis)
Tinea Versicolor (Malassezia)
Unlike the other Tinea family members, Tinea Versicolor is caused by a yeast that normally lives on your skin. The melassazia family of yeasts. It is also not contagious.
Tinea Versicolor and Vitiligo appear with similar symptoms: including discolored patches of skin. The woman pictured here on our site has Vitiligo, but it gives you an idea of what kind of discoloration appears in both and how they look similar.
Tinea is caused by a fungus whereas Vitiligo is an auto-immune disease. A “quick check” for a non-doctor diagnosis is to see if your skin is scaly or smooth. Vitiligo will always be smooth and Tinea often is rough and scaly. A dermatologist should be able to help you with a diagnosis. As a reminder: google is not a board certified doctor.
Our Heroes
Lemongrass Oil
Lemongrass is the leader of our gang of superheroes. Our Optimus Prime, our Superman if you will.
It has a long history of being used as a medicinal plant.
Lemongrass oil has been cited as being a great antimicrobial substance by several studies. One study in particular marks it as the most effective of the 5 we use.
That’s why when it comes to washing away fungus and bacteria at the gym, Lemongrass is the first in the fray, leading the charge.
The trick to Lemongrass’ effectiveness is a chemical it contains called citral. It’s actually the citral in the essential oil that slows down the growth of nasty fungus and bacteria.
Tea Tree Oil
The more commonly thought of hero of our bunch, Tea Tree Oil, is widely used as a therapy for fungus and bacteria.
It takes more punch from this guy than lemongrass to get the job done, but he knows how to handle himself in a fight.
The chemical in Tea Tree that does the tough work against fungus and bacteria is called Terpinen-4-ol.
Sweet Orange Oil
A lot of people think of sweet orange oil as something that smells nice.
It is a pleasant aroma to have in a soap.
But it isn’t just that. There’s some preliminary evidence that orange oil may be effective in treating Tinea Versicolor, which is caused by Malessezia Furfur.
Eucalyptus Oil
Eucalyptus is the side-kick that Tea Tree always wanted. By itself eucalyptus isn’t super powerful, but when combined with tea tree studies have shown it to be effective against a number of microbes.
There are no koalas used in our soap. We just think they’re pretty cool.
Lime Oil
Rounding out our team is Lime Oil. It may not be the heaviest hitter on the list, but it does assist our other essential oils in fighting off bacteria like E. Coli for you.
Shield Series Bar Soap
Our shield series soap bar features a basic but moisturizing composition of sunflower/safflower oil, coconut oil and palm oil. We keep the glycerin in our soap because it helps your skin keep more of its natural moisture. 2% of the bar is our proprietary combination of essential oils to help wash fungus and bacteria off your skin.
Shield Series Body Wash
Our Shield Series Body Wash uses a base of plant oils turned into soap mixed with our 2% blend of proprietary essential oils. This team means you get a zero-frills body soap that is capable of washing fungus and bacteria away.
We believe the best products are based on research that's been peer reviewed. Here's a few of the articles we used as references when designing our shield series products.
Studies Referenced:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168160504001680
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1046/j.1365-2672.2000.00943.x/full
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2672.2012.05270.x/full
http://periodicos.ses.sp.bvs.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0073-98552012000200022&lng=es&nrm=iso&tlng=es
http://www.academicjournals.org/journal/AJPP/article-abstract/09CEA6C34328
http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1413-86702008000100014
FDA Disclaimer: These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent disease.
Per FDA Guidelines we must also let you know that natural remedies like essential oils are not as effective as medicated solutions.