Can You Freeze Your Beauty Products? 護膚品可唔可以冷藏或者雪藏保存?

Mini refrigerators for your skin care are getting more and more popular. But why does putting skin care products in the refrigerator make them last longer? What about freezing them? 

So why do products “go off” or expire in the first place? Basically, it all comes down to chemical reactions.

On the microscopic level, what needs to happen to create a chemical reaction is for the chemical bonds to break and rearrange. Molecules do this by moving around and running into each other. If the molecules don’t run into each other hard enough the chemical bonds don’t break and therefore there is no chemical reaction. A very important factor in this process is temperature! Higher heat means that molecules are moving around faster and running into each other more often, which causes chemical reactions. On the other hand, colder temperatures reduce the speed and impact of molecules and therefore the number of chemical reactions. 

So, if I freeze my products they will last forever right?? If your products contain water (which most do!) you should think twice before freezing them.

1. If your product contains water, freezing the product will cause those water molecules to expand and also join together. So if you freeze and thaw your product it will cause the position of the water molecules to change and this will change the texture of the product. 
2. On top of that, water freezes from one side of the product to the other and the water molecules squeeze any oil molecules together. This causes separation of the product. 

WARNING! Freezing and thawing might reduce the effectiveness of the preservative in your product! A preservative needs to be correctly dispersed within a product to be effective so if the water molecules in your product have moved around after freezing and thawing it could affect the preservative system and lead to mold or bacteria growth. 

So finally, you can refrigerate your products to help them to last longer, but freezing them can lead to texture changes and possibly cause them to go off even sooner. 

Special note! Many companies talk about freezing sheet masks before using them. Our SOS Booster Hydrating and Brightening Mask should not be put in the freezer in order to keep the ingredients working at their peak effectiveness - particularly the hyaluronic acid.

迷你美容雪櫃」而家越黎越受歡迎，但點解將護膚品放入雪櫝會keep得好啲呢？咁如果直接凍結呢？
係咪只要我雪起所有護膚品，就可以永遠都用得? 如果你用緊嘅產品含有水（多數產品都係），就應該係雪之前三思。

1. 如果產品含有水份，凍結嘅過程會令水分子膨脹並結合在一起。所以，當你將產品解凍個陣就會令水分子發生變化，有機會令產品質地改變。
2. 最重要嘅係，水會由產品嘅一邊凍結到另一邊，而水分子會將油分子擠壓在一起，有機會令產品成份分離。

仲有一個問題，凍結或解凍都可能會降低產品中防腐劑嘅功效! 防腐劑需要正確分散係產品中先可以發揮作用，如果產品中嘅水分子係凍結同解凍過程中移動，會有可能影響防腐劑系統導致黴菌或細菌生長。凍結可能導致紋理變化，甚至令產品過早失效。