Wylde Blogs
Guide to buying CBD products
Guide to buying CBD products
One of the big advantages of having a ‘bricks and mortar’ shop is that we have great conversations with our customers, both new and old. These provide us with feedback (which helped develop our CBD and You range) and also invaluable insight into the wider CBD market.
What has become clear from these conversations is the lure of cheaper CBD products can be irresistible, especially once you know CBD is to be an ongoing part of your lifestyle. So why do we see these customer return if we cannot sell our products as cheaply?
It’s worth recognizing the CBD market in the UK and EU is still new, and until very recently, unregulated. There has been a proliferation of web business offering CBD, often at very low prices, which is a real concern to us and why we hope regulation will catch up quickly. Laregly becuase the prices at which some of these products are being offered are far too low to be of the quality they claim.
We worry that these opportunists are a distraction from finding a product with the real potential to improve quality of life, so much so in fact, we wrote a guide we hope will help inform decisions when choosing where to buy your CBD products;
- Consider the company
Pushy sale techniques are sure-fire giveaway as to what motivation the company had for setting up. Consider;
What approach to sales are they taking? Are they using exaggerated or evocative language to sell?
Are they product focused, offering a clear product description and full ingredients list?
Do they offer 3rd Party Lab analysis of the cannabinoid composition of the Hemp used?
Do the 3rd Party Lab results support that this legal and consistent with the product description? (Full Spectrum CBD will have a variety of cannabinoids present but should never have more than 0.2% THC to be legally sold in the UK. CBD only products should have only the Cannabidiol cannabinoid present).
Do they offer a guide for how to make best use of their products, including doseage guides?
CBD is a natural therapeutic remedy (it really doesn’t need sales rhetoric).
Tip: You might want to take a minute to Google the company’s address to see if they are a physical business, with business premises, or someone shipping product from a residence.
- Product quality
As well as 3rd Party Lab results that are easily accessible, what more is shared about the origin of the Hemp used? Is it grown using methods needed to get the natural best from Hemp?
Using all-natural growing methods with only organic fertilizer is our preference for getting the natural best from Hemp. Compared with industrial farming techniques (Pesticides and Genetic Modification) our approach will return a lower yield which inevitably raises the cost per plant and means we will not be ultra-competitive on price, but instead very competitive on quality and ultimately, great value. We think this is an important factor when looking for natural therapeutic benefits, so may be a consideration for you too when assessing CBD products.
As well as the quality of the plant cultivated, the method used the extract those lovely botanicals are really important.
You may not know that steam or solvents are the most common ways to extract botanicals from Hemp, being low cost methods. Each of these methods however has significant impact on the quality of the extract. High temperatures introduced by steam will cook and damage botanicals, whilst solvents (which are disposed of after use) have a negative environmental impact, but also taint the final product unless all of the solvent is processed our completely.
We have found using CO2 critical (sometimes called supercritical) extraction, by far the most preferable extraction method (currently available). This requires very low temperatures and importantly, has the environmental bonuses that the CO2 is reused repeatedly. The extract produced is the most naturally intact Hemp distillate which we believe offers the greatest potential to nurture wellbeing. We are also looking to develop on cold press technology as the ultimate environmentally friendly method of extraction.
- Refinement
To achieve a high-quality end product, filtration is needed to remove the less useful components of plant extract e.g. Chlorophyll. Whilst mulitstage filtration greatly increases the opportunity to make a better tasting product, it does also add time and costs with each filtration stage being quite lengthy. You are unlikely to see filtration mentioned by many suppliers (including us) as it’s a real differentiator to creating nice flavours, but something you might want to be aware of.
- End product development
Dedication to finding the best approach at each of the above stages, we truly believe, makes a huge difference to the final product and potential for realising the benefits of cannabinoids.
We will always be obsessed with quality and value, as shown most recently by developing our CBD and You range, as we believe quality delivers the best value and is the main reason we attract back our lovely customers.
- In conclusion
If you take anything from this article, please let it be that price is not the best measure of value for CBD products. Please research the company and products to ensure get the best of possible results for you.
And we sincerely hope you find a CBD product that will help you to be a better you.
CBD and You Team