I rarely do baths but showering is something I absolutely love. I wanted something that is luxurious and smells great. This almost hit the mark. It can be used primarily for showers, baths and probably as shampoo too. I have a sensitive scalp so I didn't want to use this rather than my regular shampoo.

Sadly there are certain ingredients that must be used in just about every shower gel to make it bubbly and to have some cleaning power. They also make it lighter as you don't really want to take a shower with a body lotion-like product. The good ingredient that you won't likely find in an average shower gel is the Coconut Oil. That’s something awesome! If you’ve ever tried oil based body lotions, baby oils, scrubs and whatnot you’ll know that your body will thank you for these oils. I think it’s a great addition to a shower gel and this makes it fairly unique. Don’t forget about the vitamin E (but that’s common in shampoos anyway). It’s parabens-free which is a bonus.

It has a very creamy smooth texture. You barely need to push the bottle to get some. Your hands can be wet or anything: you’ll be able to get more anytime without much effort. It’s easy to spread and makes you want to use more just because there is still a lot left (no one will notice a bit more gel missing). I use it generously but you can hardly tell whether I began the bottle already. The fluid is peachy in color and ‘glows’ nicely with some lights on.

Scent is always a great feature and I’m feeling kind of ambivalent with this. It’s supposed to be vanilla and coconut. If you just smell the liquid by taking the cap off you can only feel some faint resemblance to the other desserted island products... I got the body mousse first then the hand cream. The latter is absolutely the best thing ever (talking about body/hand moisturizers). So the smell is similar but there is a side-smell which is like plain soap. Sadly, this side smell takes over when you are under the shower… I haven’t felt like I’ve been showering with a desserted island product. The scent didn’t linger too long in the bathroom or on my skin. Maybe my expectations were too high! Imagine that after I applied some of the hand cream in the car (as a passenger) I rolled down the window as a friend came near and he instantly asked me “hey is this coconut?”. I said yes and came up with something else to talk about (didn’t want to spoil my trade secret). This effect just doesn’t happen with this shower gel. Do you know those moments when you have a sleepover/living together (with either a friend or significant other), and they take a shower and come back smelling fresh and ‘great’ or ‘wonderful’ (choose one that apply depending on your orientation and the other person’s gender and your relationship type). No this shower gel just doesn’t have enough power to get that effect either. However, that would be the result of a long development process by a much larger and older company like Nivea… I love Cake but they still have areas to improve.

How can you tell if a shower gel is working or not? It’s bubbly! Probably due to SLS, that’s the foaming agent. I sure felt clean, but I had to cover the slight remainder of the side-smell by a body lotion (desserted island body mousse of course, just to be stylish). When I didn’t do that, the scent just went away…

The bottle is 17.4 oz in volume, which is very big for a shower gel. The average bottle size is half of this! It’s pretty heavy as well. I like the cap, which closes securely. It’s the same as on many lubricants and other products where you have to press one side to have the other one pop up. It can also be screwed off. One thing to mention is that it didn’t have the safety seal. Customs opened my package and maybe they did something with it… But I like safety seals! Not sure if this is by design or the seal has been removed.
The design is lovely, the transparent plastic bottle lets you see the liquid in all its glory and the printed text on it is created nicely. There is nothing sexual about it in any way. There are some very pleasant texts on the back (in English and French). Cake does this with all of their products and it’s a good marketing point. They indicate that it’s made in Canada.