Fragrance vs Essential Oils
In Insect Repellent Candles
So what’s the difference between essential oils and fragrance, and why does it matter?
Fragrance oils are synthetically made chemical scent compounds used as alternatives to essential oils.
Essential oils are volatile plant extracts made from steam distilling or cold-pressing flowers, bark, stems, leaves, peel, roots, seeds or other parts of a plant.
Fragrance oils are much more common in candle and wax melt products than essential oils for a number of reasons. Amongst other things, they’re cheaper, easier to source and blend more easily into wax. You may find this is fine for your everyday scented candle, however, fragrance oils don’t repel insects very well.
Whether you’ve noticed or not, most big brand insect repellent candles will have something like ‘citronella fragrance’ listed as the active ingredient. This is not the same as its essential oil equivalent and one reason why it might not work as well as you’d hoped.
Essential oil based repellents such as Settlers work by aromatic diffusion. The volatile nature of essential oils means they can disperse through the air quickly and easily. These seemingly simple oils are in fact quite complicated. They contain a number of chemical components which are attached to a scent component. In the case of the essential oils used in Settlers, some of the chemical components attached to the scent possess insect repellent properties.
Their fragrance oil counterparts, however, don’t necessarily contain these properties. The composition of fragrance oils is based on scent. Because of this, there is a high chance they are lacking other chemical components usually found in the equivalent essential oil. So, while they might smell the same, the chemical make-up is different and most likely will not contain the vital repellent components.
In addition to their inferior performance, fragrance oils are also known to be damaging to your health and the environment when burned. As the artificial scent burns, it can release toxic fumes and soot into the air. If you have fur kids and feathered friends, this can be especially damaging.
At Settlers Repellent, all of our products contain only pure essential oils and plant-based ingredients.
We have been dedicated to creating the best possible insect repellent - something effective and safe while still being tough enough to withstand our diverse Australian conditions. We have worked tirelessly to ensure our candles and wax melts contain the highest possible percentage of real essential oils without causing separation or leeching of these oils from the wax.
No fragrance oils. No cutting corners. Just quality, handpicked ingredients blended exclusively for the prevention of mosquito and sandfly bites.
Because we will never settle for second best.
We are so confident that you will love our creations that…