I was extra excited about ordering my products from Essential Wholesale. I had been researching for weeks – well, at least from the evening I heard about the company. I was so excited! I was going to try a number of things at drastically low prices! I mean, as much as I enjoy some commercially available products, I hated the thought of spending $25 on conditioner or $30 on moisturizer, plus shipping.

Yes, I know there are a number of products that are available at my local Shoppers or Zellers, but one thing I had promised to myself was to start using more natural and organic products. So, I was researching them…and they are expensive.

Anyhow, when I heard that some manufacturers were duping their customers and selling Essential Wholesale’s bases as finished products with ridiculously high mark-ups I decided to go straight to the source.

So this is what I ordered:

• Peppermint & Tea Tree conditioner
• Herbal Aloe & Shea crème – to be used as a moisturizer
• Styling Hair Jelly
• Herbal Aloe & Shea shampoo – for my mom and sister to try
• Exotic Butter crème – to be used as a moisturizer
• Olive Nourishing crème – to be used a moisturizer

Last Thursday, I put in my order and – although shipping fees were beastly through UPS – my total was just over $80 US. Oh, did I mention everything is 16 oz?

Considering that 16 oz of Kinky Curly Curling Custard is $43 CDN and 16 oz of Miss Jessie’s Curly ButterCreme is $68 CDN at Honey Fig and that doesn’t include shipping, I thought that this was an excellent deal.

So, my order was in and I was expecting my products on my doorstep – or at my local post office – in a couple of weeks, right?

Wrong.

Lord, who knew how painful an ordeal this would be? OK, maybe I’m exaggerating, but it has been painful. I blame it on my own ignorance of the process. Once I sent my order in for processing, I received an automatic message saying that I had to fill out a Document of Sale and a credit card release form because I’m an international client. Sure, fine, whatever – a bit painful because I ran out of ink for my printer, but that was a situation that could be quickly rectified.

Later that evening, I got an email with some Health Canada forms. Do you know that I had to fill out six forms listing all the ingredients of each product and letting the government know that I am or am not planning to sell these items?

The issue isn’t whether or not I had to fill out the forms, but that I didn’t know that as an international client I’d be expected to. Sigh, that’s my ignorance of the whole process of ordering wholesale.

So, finally yesterday, I finished filling out all 15 pieces of paperwork (yep, 15 pieces of paperwork to get some darned hair products) and faxed them back to Essential Wholesale. I must admit, the customer service rep that I was working with was extremely helpful and that made the situation a bit less annoying, but it was annoying nonetheless.

In one respect, I’m totally wondering if this was worth the trouble, but even with the load of paperwork and shipping costs from Oregon, this will end up being cheaper in the long run (granted my products make it across the border!) I’m thinking if I order once every six to eight months or longer, it will be worth it.

Anyhow, look for an update when (if) I get my goodies!