Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

The first time I bought shea butter I bought it from a hobby products store and it was white, kinda' oily and grainy (which wasn't a problem... it had just melted and then cooled very slowly - most solid butters / oils behave that way. Once melted then cooled quickly it was smooth again) and it was very similar to coconut oil (the biggest difference that I observed between the two is that shea melts at a higher temperature). This shea butter isn't like that. The two that I bought are the same color as pictured: kind of the color of a creamy honey mustard. Between this and the grape seed oil I used in my products, my body butters are almost the color of margarine (I also use coconut and cocoa butter in them - the coconut oil lightens the color somewhat) As for the texture... this is VERY different from coconut oil. It is far denser and I find that I really don't need to use as much of this as I would have the other "prettier" product to achieve the same results. I'd say that it probably takes slightly longer to melt than it's hobby store cousin, but not much (still not as long as bees wax or cocoa butter) Because it looks so natural, my first reaction when I saw it was, "Oh, I hope there's no 'inclusions' in it... no fibers or leaves or something!" My fears have been put to rest after using the first entire container... it was pure and free of any chunks or anything dirty or undesirable. It was perfect... clean, no noticeable smell, no chunks, no yuck. Good stuff. My advice is this: if you're making products for yourself or for people who actually WANT a natural product, this is great stuff and a wonderful bargain (I'm going to order again soon) HOWEVER, if you are selling products to people who expect that every product should be white or pink or some "fluffy" color like that, I think you have 3 choices... * buy this and use only a little so your product stays white; * DON'T buy this and pay more for the bleached out stuff, or * buy it, use it, and tell your customers the truth: natural shea butter is yellow - not white. The stores are full of processed products that are bleached out and "beautified" if that's what they want. But if they want the benefits of natural products, they have to take the natural color right along with it. (The last option was obviously the one I chose) TL;DR version: Clean, great product and a super bargain. The packaging is adequate - certainly nothing fancy - but my products arrived in tact and I'm fine with not paying more for a fancy package. *** Oh, hey... I try to write reviews that actually HELP people, so if you found this review helpful, please give it a 'thumbs up' so I know that I'm on the right track. Thank you!