What Company Has the Best Essential Oils?
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Are you wanting to start using essential oils, but don't know where to start? You're ready to buy, but don't know what company has the best essential oils?
You've come to the right place.
Essential oils are all the rage these days. People say that they can do everything from being a natural ear infection remedy, to helping with weight loss, to healing eczema, and more.
I've written various posts on essential oils in which I talked about:
- Are Essential Oils a Scam and
- Using Essential Oils for Tummy Aches, Head Tension and More (with more of my skeptical thoughts)
Hopefully you can tell by those posts that I'm a skeptic at heart and pretty detailed when it comes to sorting through all the information out there to find out what really works. In fact, many of my readers and friends have called me an “investigative reporter” of sorts.
My husband says that I “second guess everything.”
In one sense, second guessing is a good thing. I've saved our family a lot of money by avoiding problematic purchases.
But sometimes I can go overboard and spend way too much time analyzing a product or purchase. (Kind of like driving all over town to save a few pennies. Not smart, especially as I saw gas at $4.11/gallon coming home from church last night. Big sigh.)
When trying to sort out this issue about which essential oils company is best, I tried not to be too analytical at first, and simply used what worked. But then, things changed.
The Search for the Best Essential Oil
In the Are Essential Oils a Scam? – A Skeptic Looks at Thieves Oil, I shared how I held off trying really any essential oils at all for years before trying Thieves® from Young Living.
Truth be told, I did have a few old bottles of essential oils in my linen closet. One bottle each of orange, eucalyptus, melaleuca (tea tree) oil, and rose oil, which I bought for topical use to brighten up my laundry [ended up never using it] and for my Homemade Chest Rub and Homemade Rose Water Spray.
This time around, before buying the Thieves oil and signing up as a Young Living Distributor, I dug around a little, but not too much.
I asked about all the rumors surrounding Gary Young, the founder of Young Living and I also asked some questions about purity of essential oils.
I got some satisfactory answers and was pretty amazed at how well the Thieves oil had worked. And I was thrilled to have great resources in my natural health care arsenal.
I mean, who wants to put more toxins in your body if you don't have to, right?
However, after my post on Young Living's Thieves and the other oils (Wintergreen and Peppermint, etc.), a number of readers started asking me about other oil companies. And so I too started wondering.
At first, I thought, “This stuff works great, and I'm pretty worn out right now, so I am just going to leave this alone and not start digging for more information”
But the “investigative reporter” in me just couldn't leave. it. alone.
So I started poking around.
Today I'm sharing with you the beginning of my investigation.
Other Essential Oils Companies
There were some essential oils companies that I knew of, and some that a few readers recommended to me.
One of my readers was a doTERRA rep who said I really should check out their company to see how it measured up to Young Living.
Little did I know what lay ahead of me.
I started out with just a small list of companies, but the list quickly grew as the series went on and as more and more readers commented and as I went down more and more rabbit trails.
I think you'll find the whole thing interesting and I hope you'll learn a thing or two about essential oils and the companies that sell them.
The Competitors:
(UPDATE: A lot changed after I started this series. Please follow the links at the bottom of this post to see how interesting everything got – you can hop on over to read Part 2 of “The Best Essential Oils” here.
To start off, following are the essential oils companies that were “on my radar” and so I started with these, wondering if I should stick with Young Living or switch to another company to be my family's “best essential oils company” of choice
- Mountain Rose Herbs
- Aura Cacia
- DoTerra
- Young Living
- Heritage Oils
- Native American Nutritionals (now Rocky Mountain Oils)
- North American Herb and Spice
and more. Truth is, I called a TON of companies and read up on others. These all included: - NOW oils
- Butterfly Express
- Spark Naturals
- Edens Garden
- North American Herb and Spice, and on and on.My head really started to spin with all of the phone calls and notes I was taking, but I started with just those listed above and went from there.
This is not an exhaustive list as there are a TON of essential oils companies out there. After writing this series I felt like I really opened a can of worms, but these are the companies that I started with.
Hang with me – it gets pretty interesting from here on out.
IMPORTANT UPDATE
I'm updating this post years later to add important information. I do not have all of the information in this series on why I didn't choose certain companies so I would appreciate you not accusing me of coming to silly conclusions. I have gotten threatening emails (some of them were cryptic threats), and have been warned about being sued if I published certain things.
My family is important to me and while I don't like to succumb to this kind of bullying, I have to weigh the cost of all of this. I am trying to be as upfront as I can about my decisions. Just know that what you are reading here is not the whole story. Not at all.
The Challenge
Following are some of the companies that I looked into.
1. Young Living Oils
I first tried Young Living when I thought that essential oils were a scam. I used them for a while and since I wanted to get as many savings as possible on the oils, I purchased monthly, took advantage of discounts, and stocked up quite a bit.
2. doTERRA Oils
Just before starting this series, several of my readers told me that I should really look into doTERRA as well, before making a hard and fast decision about which company to go with long term. So, I signed up with doTERRA as well. Follow along and you will see what happened next.
3. Mountain Rose Herbs
I like Mountain Rose Herbs' mission and have a few bottles of their oils. When I contacted them they told me that they did not recommend internal use of their oils as they were not produced in a food-grade facility.
Much later (after this whole series was done) I contacted them again and they said that this was not the case. The company also told me several times at later dates that they didn't test their oils but trusted their sources.
4. Butterfly Express
This seemed like a good company to check out, but I ran into quite a bit of trouble getting information from them. When I called to ask them a number of questions, I was able to get some information, but then I was told that they didn't have time to talk with me.
5. Native American Nutritionals (now Rocky Mountain Oils)
When I first contacted this company, I thought that their prices seemed a little high for a company that wasn't an MLM, but the more I talked to them the more interesting it all got.
You'll have to read more in the series to see what happened with this company….
THE VERDICT: Probable high quality with no apparent earnings opportunity. Need to check into this company more.
6. North American Herb and Spice
From all I could figure out, this is a great company.
However, all they make is oregano oil.
So if you just want oregano oil, then this is a good place to turn.
THE VERDICT: Oregano is a pretty amazing oil, but I want more than just that in my natural healing arsenal.
7. Aura Cacia
I personally have a number of Aura Cacia oils that I bought prior to really digging into oils. I can't say anything except for my personal experience which is that they don't smell as potent as some of the other oils that I have.
I do like the company but for now, I'm not choosing to get my oils from them. That being said, I think that they have a lot of great information about oils and their use.
Well, this is a long enough post already – thanks for sticking with me!
Onto the other competitors in the next post and see what happens!
A Great Essential Oils Book for Your Library
There are so many books out there on essential oils, that it's hard to know what to buy. I have a bunch, but this one, The Encyclopedia of Essential Oils, is a fantastic choice. It's very highly recommended by many aromatherapists.
At the bottom of each of my posts in this series are books or other kinds of products that I love that relate to essential oils.
The Essential Oil Company I Prefer
If you're in a hurry to find out which essential oil company I went with at the end of this search, read the following post:
– Announcing “the Best” Essential Oils Company – Part 7
More Essential Oils Posts
Over the years, I've rewritten some of the posts in this series to make them more helpful. Here are some more posts to help you on your essential oils journey.
– Qualities of a Good Oils Company
– Tips to Spot Fake Essential Oils
– Young Living vs. doTERRA
– Are Multi-Level Marketing Oils Worth It?
– Distillation, Bias, Vomit and More Concerns
you can also read this post on Essential Oils Testing which gives you more information on how essential oils are tested for purity.
Free Essential Oils Report and VIP Newsletter Access
Also, if you go and grab my Free Report on 10 Things to Know About Essential Oils Before You Buy, you will not only get more myth-busting essential oils information, but you'll get access to my VIP newsletter as well–complete with updates, great healthy living offers, of course new posts on essential oils, and more.
What are your thoughts?
Hello, I’m interested in purchasing some of the oils blends. Could you please send me the list that you mentioned if use to doterr’s blends of oils? Mainly for OnGuard/Protective Blend, Elevation/Joyful Blend and Balance/Grounding Blend. I read through all Native American blend oils and there’s so many, I would appreciate some guidance. I’m new to EO and would like to know if book/guide book to assist with what oils to use for different issues. Thank you again. I appreciated the article!
HI there. There are books on almost all of the posts in this series, and this book was recommended to me by some in the field. I hope to have a post on books soon!
I personally was sold on doTERRA oils, but sometimes I feel like from batch to batch you can see significant differences, especially with their Geranium oil which I blend up for my female clients a lot. The smell should not differ that much. I started trying some of the NYR Organics, after seeing 3rd party testing on a blog that showed they were one of only 3 companies out of 10 that had peppermint oil in compliance. I’ve been totally in love with their oils. The downside is that here in the US they don’t have a large selection of essential oils available yet like they have in the UK.
I do think it’s fine for there to be variations. In fact, the owner of Native American said it’s not a good sign when oils all smell the same from year to year. As for NYR and the 3rd party testing, I don’t know which testing you mean, but I have concerns about one of the sources doing testing out there. They are getting the oil out of bottles and putting them in other bottles which can lead to error and contamination. Plus there was one error with the testing in which the tester ordered the wrong oil and the published results stating that the oil wasn’t compliant. Finally, there was a company that wasn’t in compliance and later got to “redo” the test and then they passed. After that there was an affiliate link in the post to that company. That I find to be very suspicious. Of course, if a company is found to have a problematic oil and then they submit another sample they are basically admitting that they had bad oils. I guess one could take it as them realizing they had bad oils and correcting it. Hard to know.
I hope that makes sense. No idea if we are talking about the same thing and nothing against NYR, but those are my thoughts.
Okay so after reading your report, I was wondering who does make a high quality organic non gmo ingestable essential oil. I have just recently begun my looking into essential oils and have had many friends sign up for Do Terra but when I contacted Doterra they would not say if there oils were gmo or not they just repeated that they are high quality.. that turns me of. I want a guarantee that the oils I will be using are non gmo,organic and edible. I would also like to sign up to distribute such oils.
I had a lot of trouble w/ doTERRA support. Nice people but not enough answers. Did you read the whole series?
I’ve been buying Young Living Essential Oils for many years. I’ve always loved their oils. However, I recently purchased a three pack of Thieves Hand Sanitizer and it smelled like cat urine!! I was horrified! I called Young Living and asked if they changed their formula. They said “Yes.”
I received a huge order today, including two bottles of Lavender. I opened one bottle and it smells AWFUL! How could their wonderful Lavender smell so bad? Did they change that formula, also?
I wrote to customer service and, hopefully, they’ll get back to me soon.
I’m SO disappointed in YL. I may have to start searching for a different company. 🙁
I hope you read to the end of the series. I would love to know what you think. I will say that a company’s oils shouldn’t always smell exactly the same b/c plants change. But urine is a little extreme :).
Can u make videos on youtube plesae
Hi there. I am swamped but what kind of video are you interested in?
I was really impressed with your research. I was wondering what you thought about Butterfly Express.
Sorry but I just can’t comment on / evaluate the companies anymore. I’m just swamped. You can check out this post to see what you think and I hope to write more – thanks and sorry for the delay.https://wholenewmom.com/health-concerns/toxic-overload-health-concerns/essential-oils-testing-is-it-reliable/
I was wondering if you had more information on Spark Naturals that you could share w/ me? I am doing a little of my own research and was curious what you found out. Thanks!
Sorry but I just can’t comment on / evaluate the companies anymore. I’m just swamped. You can check out this post to see what you think and I hope to write more – thanks and sorry for the delay.https://wholenewmom.com/health-concerns/toxic-overload-health-concerns/essential-oils-testing-is-it-reliable/
why is there an ad i can’t close covering a good portion of the text? how can i read this post?
Are you by chance on mobile? I can do what I can on my end. I’ve had 3 reports of this sort and I suspect it’s that my site isn’t mobile optimized yet. I will see what I can do to rectify it in the meantime. Thanks for any info you can share.
I was happy to find this blog with the research about companies that sell true therapeutic quality EOs that could be trusted, and surprised that only one company, Native American Nutritionals is the only one. Really, one one company. If that is true, then why are they putting coconut oil in most of their blends? Quoting from the book “Butterfly Miracles with Essential Oils”
“There are those who claim that adding a little bit
of carrier oil causes only an insignificant amount of damage and the trade-off for convenience and ease of application is worth it. I do not agree!! Logically, the reason citrus oils and absolutes breakdown is because of the larger molecules (proteins, amino acids, etc.). Adding proteins, etc., with their larger molecules can only increase the rate of breakdown. While the addition of essential oils slows the break down of the molecules in the carrier oil (they do not smell rancid as quickly), the therapeutic properties of the essential oil are still altered as the larger molecules break down. There are studies that back this position up very soundly, but every day, practical experience with these diluted oils has been enough to convince me. It is best to keep your carrier oils separate and mix them together as you use them. The only possible reasons that I can see for the practice of mixing pure oils with carrier before the time of sale are: 1) that the oil would be a little easier to apply in a hurry over a large area, and 2) since carrier oils are cheaper than essential oils, more profit could be made by their sale. I believe that the profit factor is the bottom line here, since mixing as you use them is not that difficult or inconvenient”.
And…
“Never mix your pure essential oils into a carrier oil and then store them that way! The therapeutic
properties of the oil break down rapidly when mixed with vegetable protein oils and you are left with a
massage oil of low quality that does not even smell as good as the original essence”.
*
I wouldn’t want to buy Essential Oil blends with a carrier oil mixed in any more than buying extra virgin olive oil with the second pressing, or even non-olive oil, mixed in (quite common) or honey with high fructose corn syrup mixed in. Pretty disappointing to find out about a company that supposedly has all these great small farmers, organic practices, etc., and then at the last minute adds in an inexpensive carrier oil to the 15 ml bottles that deteriorates the Essential Oil
If there is a good reason that Native American Nutritionals does this, I’d like to know, otherwise, I’ll pass on their blends and maybe learn about mixing my own blends with their single Essential Oils which don’t seem to be pre-mixed with a carrier oil, at least the few that I checked weren’t.
Regards,
Lance
Hi Lance. This is the response from the owner of Native American Nutritionals:
among aromatherapists, herbalists and others, the general opinion is that the large essential oil companies including Auracacia, Doterra and Young Living are better at marketing than delivering the quality and purity that they advertise. We gravitate towards the small companies run by people who our teachers and colleagues know are trustworthy.
I prefer smaller companies too. Thanks!