DM-W

The public requests products for the detergency of animal coats more and more sophisticated with regard to the formulation profile, and especially endowed with specific properties for different breeds and kinds of hair, however fully respecting the end-user and the environment.

The "philosophy" of cosmetic enterprises has been and still is looking for always purer, more innocuous and hypoallergenic raw materials. The history of hair cleansing products has made remarkable progress in the last century. Shampoos made of solutions of soap have been replaced by products containing sodium lauryl sulphate, the first synthetic surface-active agent, solving several cosmetic and dermatological problems (problems linked to hard waters, very alkaline pH, and so on). The growing use of shampoos by consumers lead to a request of even less irritating products; so cosmetic industry introduced other surface-active agents which, added to the primary surface-active agent, attenuate its irritating power. Nevertheless, that was not enough to obtain a gentle cleansing product; for this reason, coadjuvants were introduced; they are not surface-active agents, but substances lowering the irritating power of cleansing substances.

Who has been working for a long time – as Baldecchi has - in the field of animal hygiene deeply knows the problems of hair and under-hair cleansing, of hair colour, and he/she knows that a shampoo which has been conceived for people is not suitable for animals.
Baldecchi's intuition was that of going towards a new idea of formulation:

• looking for substances going to replace the "classical" surface-active agents, generally aggressive, without lowering the cleansing power of the final product;
• looking for substances which, acting as coadjuvants, would give the finished products the ideal properties of deodorizing and moisturizing without irritating.

This investigation lead to the formulation of a mud or cleansing clay, whose main component is not the primary surface-active agent - or another surface-active substance – but a "residual clay" with theoretic chemical formula Al2O3.2SiO2.2H2o and average granulometry less than 2 microns. The cleansing action of this hydrate aluminium silicate is based on the absorption of fats and dirt; this substance balances the cellular lipidic level without an excessive degreasing action, avoiding the well-known "rebound effect" often caused by shampoos on sale. The absorbing power is due not only to Van der Waals forces, usually active in montmorillonites, but also to the electrostatic forces due to the polarity of molecules. Hydrate aluminium silicate is an efficacious deodorant, thanks to its astringent properties, due to the high percentage of aluminium. The acidity of "residual clay" gives the product a pH which is ideal for the skin, so that adding acidifiers is not necessary. Having eliminated substances like sodium chloride has given as a result an innocuous, non-irritating product. Coadjuvant substances have optimized the product, with the following results:

• Skin hydration: both for the cat/dog and the professional groomer;
• Deodorization: the product eliminates the animal bad smell, not covering it with perfumes which, when they disappear, can leave a disagreeable smell;
• Help against irritations; investigations have demonstrated than with washings repeated every 7 days, the product has proved to be efficacious against irritations, reducing them in over than 50% of the cases taken into consideration.

 Directions for use: DM.W can be diluted up to 5 times with warm water, depending on the pet’s needs. A 20 kilos dog needs 4 spoons of DM.W in 250 ml. of water; this mixture has to be shaken in order to homogenize it completely and used both to pre-wash and to wash the animal. DM.W doesn’t produce abundant foam, as its cleansing action is not based on surface-actives, but on “residual clay”.