Not all 100% Tea Tree Oil is equal, apparently

Disclosure: This post contains an Amazon affiliate link.
I've posted about my love for pure tea tree oil as a spot treatment for zits before. I won't repeat everything I said there, but basically benzoyl peroxide never does anything for me (plus I can't manage to ever use it without bleaching the fuck out of all my towels and sheets). Tea tree oil, on the other hand, works. YMMV etc. That's just what works for me.

Anyway, in the winter I ran out of my Mason Naturals tea tree oil, and so I ordered a different brand from Amazon, since it was about a dollar cheaper at the time: Now Foods. Both of them say that they are 100% tea tree oil, so what's the difference? Honestly, I have no idea, but the Now Foods stuff didn't do shit. It says on the bottle that it's meant for "aromatherapy," whereas the Mason one says "pharmaceutical grade," but that doesn't seem very meaningful to me. I mean, 100% tea tree oil with nothing else in it should be the same thing either way, right?

Remember when I was complaining earlier this year about giant cystic pimples that would not fucking die? I couldn't figure out why tea tree oil had stopped working for me. But you know, the Now Foods version didn't have the same very slight tingle when I applied it, and it didn't do something that I actually found annoying about the Mason stuff - when I dab it near my mouth, but not too near, say a centimeter away or so, it would always migrate to my lips so I could taste it. Bleh. The Now Foods stuff didn't do that. These two things alone suggest that something different was going on. I thought maybe I was misremembering or imagining how well the previous bottle had worked on my acne, but eventually I got so fed up that I just ordered another bottle of Mason tea tree oil.

And what do you know? It fucking works. Used daily only directly on top of a zit, dabbed on with a q-tip, it will stop a pimple in its tracks and force it into retreat. So what I'm saying is that if you are considering trying tea tree oil for acne, you should try the Mason Naturals one. It's about $8 on Amazon right now, though the price fluctuates, and you might be able to find it cheaper if you shop around. I don't know what is in that Now Foods bottle, but it doesn't work the same. I've been using the remainder a few drops at a time in my garbage cans to freshen them up. Aromatherapy, I guess.

Cheap and Natural: Tea Tree Oil for Acne

I know that benzoyl peroxide spots treatment are the industry standard for acne (things like Persagel, etc.), but for some reason they do nothing for me except bleach my pillowcases. Not only do they not get rid of zits, they don't even stop them from getting worse. I've tried a bunch of different brands.

If you have the same problem, you might want to give tea tree oil a try. It works wonders for me. Sometimes I can feel one of those great big subsurface pimples brewing, and if I get to it fast enough with the tea tree oil, it'll halt it in its tracks (mixed metaphors? whatever). And in the meantime it doesn't get any worse. It just gives up and fades away. So you can imagine that it also does well with more run of the mill crap. It also sort of dries up and heals the surface of gross oozing ones, so that I can put on my makeup or whatever without it being nasty.

Tea tree oil has anti-bacterial properties, so in principle it should work the same as benzoyl peroxide. But skin is weird, and everyone's responds differently to different things. I use this 100% tea tree oil, and just dip a Q-tip in it and dab it on the spots that need it once or twice a day. It has a strong medicinal smell, kind of like menthol or eucalyptus, but I don't mind it too much. Be careful if you have a zit too near your mouth and you use this, because it tends to migrate and tastes kind of nasty. Minor unpleasantness if you find it works for you, though. I've been using my bottle for about 4 months now, and I haven't even got through a 6th of it, so it's definitely cost effective at around $9 a bottle. I'd suggest making sure what you're buying is 100% tea tree oil, though, because otherwise it might not have enough potency to get the job done (for instance, this one from The Body Shop lists water and alcohol as the first ingredients. No.).

Disclosure: This post contains an affiliate link.