To be honest, I thought this series was pretty much done and dusted - well in my mind at least because in Parts 1-4, I discovered several aluminium-free deodorants that met my needs, and I was perfectly happy with their performance, presentation and fragrance. But just the other day I was excited to spot four in Coles I hadn't noticed before - Tom's of Maine Long Lasting Wild Lavender Deodorant, Only Good Natural Deodorant, Mitchum Natural Power Bamboo Powder Coconut & Brutal Truth Rustic & Woody Antiperspirant Roll-On (for men). All of them were $10 or less and given their supermarket accessibility and price, plus two are the wind-up-stick kind (my personal favourite), I couldn't possibly pass up the opportunity to put them under the kats microscope (and under my arms) to see how they compared to the more expensive and not-so-easily-available ones I'd settled on back in January last year...
Tom's of Maine Long Lasting Deodorant - Wild Lavender (64g, RRP $10)
Mitchum Natural Power Bamboo Powder - Coconut (40g, RRP $7.50)
Mitchum is a highly respected deodorant manufacturer, specialising in clinical performance products, so I had high hopes for this one. It's vegan, dermatologically tested, cruelty-free, has no artificial preservatives, and the scent of the creamy wind-up stick is subtle and vaguely coconutty. Sadly it also didn't work all that well for me. Once the thermometer climbed up to 25, I was a sticky, stinky mess. Boo! I reapplied it a few times and managed to avoid the necessity for immediate showering. Admittedly my benchmark is pretty fierce - I want my deo to last all day, and I'm sticking with that because I have found ones that do just that. But I will hang onto this one to see how it goes in the cooler weather. Disappointing 4/10...
Only Good Natural Deodorant - Honeysuckle & Elderflower (50ml, RRP $10)
I wasn't able to smell the scent through my mask but I chose this one out of the three available because I thought it would be the most subtle (others are Rosehip/Marshmallow, Manuka Honey/Chamomile). Probably wasn't the best choice as it smells quite sour in the bottle, and that's not a good start for a deodorant. In its favour, you can see from the list of exclusions below that it's a pretty good attempt at being natural, but again, this one performed about the same as the other two above - as soon as the mercury rose, or I started any sort of activity outside my normal daily routine, it failed to keep me dry or odour-free. Because it doesn't smell very nice at all I didn't bother to reapply, 3/10...
Brutal Truth Rustic & Woody Antiperspirant Roll-On (75ml, RRP $10)
