Now Solutions Completely Kissable Vanilla Lip Balm

Texture: Smooth and creamy.

Flavour: Unpleasant, quite sour.

Fragrance: Vanilla.

Finish: Slightly shiny.

Lasting power: Two hours.

Colour: Clear.

Longevity: Not stated.

Size: 0.15oz, 4.25g.

Price: I purchased mine for $3.17 from iHerb.

Website: www.nowfoods.com

Discontinued: No.

Limited Edition: No.

Rating: 3 out of 5.

If you like this, try: Any other balm that tastes awful.

Ingredients: sunflower oil, beeswax, extra virgin olive oil, vanilla flavour, hemps seed oil, vitamin E.

I really wanted to like this lip balm. The packing is nice, it's organic, smells good and has great ingredients. There's just one thing letting it down. It tastes bad. Really bad. I can't deal with a lip balm that tastes bad. Either make it flavourless or make it taste nice.  Surely it's not that difficult?
If it wasn't for the awful taste this would be a great balm. It smells lovely, feels really nice, very soft and soothing. At first it tastes nice but within a few minutes it starts to taste really bad.

Lost Planet Cacao Mint Lip Butter

Texture: Smooth and creamy

Flavour: Choc mint

Fragrance: Choc mint

Finish: Glossy

Lasting power: Around two hours

Colour: Clear

Longevity: Around twelve months

Size: 8 grams

Price: $12 (AUD)

Availability: https://www.facebook.com/lostplanetsw/

Website: https://www.instagram.com/lostplanetsw/


Discontinued: No

Limited Edition: No

Rating: 4

If you like this, try: Badger Cocoa Butter Lip Balm

Ingredients: cacao butter, coconut oil, candelilla wax, hemp seed oil, vanilla extract, vitamin e, peppermint oil.

I'm slowly trying to switch to zero waste products, which with lip balms isn't very easy. Whilst I appreciate cardboard packaging it can get quite greasy and messy.
The other issue is that if the balm goes all lumpy it can't be saved.
That's what happened with my Lost Planet balm. The cacao butter went lumpy and I couldn't heat it up to fix it so I had to throw it out. Thankfully it's compostible so I buried it in the garden.

If you're a lip balm collector this isn't the balm for you. This is a balm for someone who is going to use it exclusively until it's finished. Being organic and natural it's not a long lasting balm so you need to use it within twelve months or it will go off.

Despite all that I really enjoyed my Lost Planet lip butters and would buy one again if I came across it.

Salt by Hendrix Blush Lip Butter

Image from Salt by Hendrix

Texture: Slightly gritty

Flavour: None

Fragrance: None

Finish: Glossy

Lasting power: A few hours

Colour: Sheer light pink

Size: 10ml

Price: $14.95

Availability: Salt by Hendrix website and

Website: www.saltbyhendrix.com

Rating: 3.5

If you like this, try: The Body Shop Lip Butter

Ingredients: shea butter, coconut oil, cocoa butter, carnauba wax, argan oil, jojoba oil, mandarin oil, vitamin E, iron oxide.

I'd like to give you a little background on the Salt by Hendrix range, but their website is sorely lacking, so I know nothing about them. 

Their lip butter is an interesting little thing. When I first scoop it out it feels a little dry and slightly gritty but once I rub it into my lips the grittiness disappears and I'm left with a smooth, soft balm.

The tint is very sheer, on my lips it's undetectable, however I have quite pigmented lips. If you have pale lips it would be noticeable. There is also a rose colour that is darker if you are wanting something with more colour to it. 

I gave this a rating of 3.5 because it's unremarkable. It's not great, it's not awful. It gets the job done.

Alaffia Everyday Coconut Purely Coconut Lip Balm

Image from Alaffia

Texture: Smooth and creamy

Flavour: Awful

Fragrance: Coconut

Finish: Slightly glossy

Lasting power: A few hours

Colour: Clear


Size:  0.15oz 4.25g

Price: $3.06

Availability: Alaffia and iHerb

Website: alaffia.com.au


Rating: 1

If you like this, try: Crazy Rumors, their flavours are so much better.

Ingredients: coconut oil, candelilla wax, cocoa butter, natural coconut flavour.

I threw this balm in the bin. That's not something I do very often, usually my unloved balms go to the boys, but this one tastes so bad that it went straight into the bin. I have no idea why it tastes so bad, it's not off, it smells good and the ingredients look fine. Perhaps I got a bad one. 

It's a shame the flavour is so awful because the balm is nice. It's soft, creamy, hydrating and feels lovely on my lips.

Vapour Organic Beauty Lux Lip Conditioner

Texture: Smooth and creamy

Flavour: Apricot

Fragrance: Apricot

Finish: Slightly glossy

Lasting power:Two to three hours

Colour: Clear


Size: 0.135oz/3.82g

Price: $28.75

Availability: Vapours website and various natural/organic stores

Website:  http://www.vapourbeauty.com

Discontinued: No

Limited Edition: No

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

If you like this, try: Burt's Bees Mango Butter lip balm.

Ingredients: jojoba seed oil, beeswax, coconut oil, castor seed oil, fig flavour oil, plum and apricot flavour oil, helichrysum arenarium flower extract, lemon balm leaf extract, calendula officinalis flower extract.

Vapour says : Pure relief and comfort for lips with Lux’s heavenly, emollient formula. A synergistic organic botanical blend of Coconut, Fig, Plum and Calendula soothes and protects delicate skin in one creamy, luxurious swipe.

I'm a bit on the fence about this balm. Whilst I like it, it's not love. For the price I want to love it more than I do. It's nice but when you compare it to other similar balms such as Burt's Bees, I just can't rate it very highly. Despite that, it is a lovely balm and one that I enjoyed using. 

The fruity fragrance and flavour it lovely, it leaves a beautiful sheen and is hydrating enough to keep my lips in good condition.

Miessence Jaffa Lip Balm

Image credit

Texture: Rich and creamy

Flavour: Very light chocolate/orange.

Fragrance: Jaffa.

Finish: Soft shine.

Lasting power: Three hours.

Colour: Clear.

Longevity: 6 months.

Size: 3.5gram/0.12oz

Price: $8.95

Availability: Health shops and their website.

Website: www.miessence.com

Discontinued: No.

Limited Edition: No.

Rating: 4.5

If you like this, try: The Body Shop Cocoa Butter Lip Care Stick.

Ingredients: Organic sunflower seed oil, organice shea fruit butter, organic beeswax, organic avocado fruit oil, organic sweet orange essential oil, organic vanilla CO2 extract, organic rosemary leaf CO2 extract, limonene.

Years ago I tried the Miessence Jaffa lip balm and it was a grainy, awful mess that ended up in the bin. Fast forward about ten years and I decided to give it another go. This time I was pleasantly surprised at how lovely it is. The texture is beautifully creamy, very hydrating and a pleasure to use. I love the slim tube, it fits easily in my pocket which is always a bonus. 

Coco Kind Original Lip Balm

Image credit

Texture: Creamy and smooth.

Flavour: Coconut.

Fragrance: Coconut.

Finish: Soft shine.

Lasting power: Three hours.

Colour: Clear.

Longevity: Not stated.

Size: 0.15oz/4.25ml.

Price: Around $4.

Availability: I purchased mine from iHerb, I've seen it at health shops and you can purchase from the Coco Kind website.

Website: www.cocokind.com


Discontinued: No.

Limited Edition: No.

Rating: 1


Ingredients: Organic fair trade certified virgin coconut oil, organic yellow beeswax.

I really wanted to love this balm but I can't. It's so soft that it's unusable. The texture is what you'd expect for a balm that comes in a pot, not one that comes in a tube. Even in winter it's too soft to use, I end up with a thick layer of balm smeared over my lips which I have to wipe off, wasting the excess. The flavour and fragrance are beautiful as you'd expect from a coconut oil lip balm, it's just a shame about the texture. I end up applying it with my finger which is rather annoying.

Kora Vitamin Enhanced Lip Balm

Texture: Smooth, non waxy

Flavour: None.

Fragrance: This has a light, pleasant floral scent.

Finish: Glossy. It looks great worn over lip liner or a matte lipstick.

Lasting power: About four hours.

Colour: Clear

Longevity: 12 months

Size: 6.5ml

Price: $24.95

Availability: Chemmart, Terry White Chemists, David Jones and online.

Website: koraorganics.com

Brand Contact: Via their website here.  


Ingredients: castor oil, beeswax, castor isostearate beeswax succinate, jojoba oil, coconut oil, cetyl palmitate, sorbitan palmitate, sorbitan olivate, d-alpha tocopheryl acetate (soybean derived natural  natural vitamin e), avocado oil, rosehip oil, lime oil, vitamin c, acerola cherry powder, maltodextrin, noni fruit, limonene.

Kora says: The ultimate lip balm for smooth, soft, moist lips. The highest quality jojoba, avocado, rosehip and nutrient rich extracts have been organically flavoured to taste and feel simply sublime. Our vitamin enhanced formula contains vitamin C and E to soothe and smooth and renew even the driest of chapped lips leaving them soft and kissable.

This is the lip balm that didn't end! I was trying to use it up forever, just ask Emma. I was constantly complaining to her that the lip balm fairies kept on refilling the balm at night when I was asleep. Through sheer persistence I finally managed to finish it! Whilst this is a nice lip balm it's not one that I'll purchase again. It does a great job of keeping my lips hydrated, it smells nice, has no flavour and is a good balm, but there is nothing about it that makes it worth the $24.95 price tag. In my opinion Sukin's Nourishing Lip Treatment is a much nicer balm and it only costs $8.95. Added to that, the Kora balm comes in a pot and I find potted balms so much more inconvenient, they don't fit easily in a pocket so are the type of balms that I only use at home.

What I do love is that 100% of the total ingredients are from natural origin and 88.8% of the total ingredients are from organic farming.