In this review, you get to meet another company, Cypress Hemp out of Louisiana, which produces a focused variety of CBD products, including both broad and full spectrum extracts; in this round, you will learn about their full spectrum extract, along with the company behind the products. To make sure you understand our scoring process, we offer a quick explanation before diving into our review.
Table of Contents
How We Score Products
There are four categories which go into our scoring algorithm:
- Potency – we first send off the product to an independent lab who analyzes and measures the amount of CBD content present in the product; this is the only objective factor in our analysis, so the score is weighted by five points
- Effects – each of our testers shares their personal experience; as this is subjective, the score is weighed by one
- Taste – our testers also share their opinion of the flavor of product under review; another subjective factor, it also has a weight of one
- Packaging – we also share our ideas and perspectives on the packaging of the product; this final subjective factor is also given a weight of one
All four categories start with a beginning value of 10 points; negative aspects shave points off the starting value of 10. (You can get more details of how our scoring is calculated at our CBD algorithm page.)
Now on to Cypress Hemp and their CBD + Omegas Full Spectrum Extract.
Cypress Hemp
Regular readers of our reviews know how much we appreciate learning about the origins of the company whose product we are reviewing. This is not always easy, with some companies offering little or no insights about their people behind the business or their driving motivations. Theoretically, not being privy to inside information about the founding and growing of the company should not impact our experience of their products. In actuality, though, we know that the better we get to know the people operating the enterprise, the more we appreciate the efforts they put into their products. More importantly, by working with transparent owners, they reveal their working practices which makes their products stand out from the crowd, along with the various methods of preparing their products for public consumption. It’s all well and good to claim your product is organically grown and ethically harvested, but to demonstrate the fact with words and pictures proves that it’s more than talk.
With Cypress Hemp, we meet a company whose owners are ecstatic about sharing their story. And a compelling story it is, indeed. It began six years before the company’s founding, in 2012, when co-founder Kristy Hebert, then a student at LSU, was a pedestrian victim of a drunken hit-and-run accident which left her with a shattered pelvis, among other traumatic injuries. It took her over six months of intensive rehabilitation to learn to walk again, but Hebert was also struggling with heavy medications which clouded her thinking and left her in a regular fog. The side effects of the painkillers were so intense, that she began looking at alternative pain relief options… and first encountered the healing powers of CBD.
Over the objections of her doctors, Hebert switched from opiates to CBD and reclaimed her life in the process. Naturally, she also became a vocal proponent and supporter of CBD as a medical alternative. In the fall of 2018, she partnered up with Blake Bilger, and established Cypress Hemp. Adhering to the same strong ethics and beliefs that returned Hebert to a healthy state of body and mind, the company has experienced phenomenal growth while building a solid unwavering reputation as a business committed to wellness and well-being. (Read here Hebert’s full real-life inspirational story.)
There is something especially appealing about entrepreneurs more excited about sharing wellness than scooping up profits, and the owners of Cypress Hemp imbue that quality in everything they do. We were sold on Cypress Hemp because of the dedication and commitment of the founders in tandem with an amazing story which reveals the potential power of CBD. And knowing their story and motivation for creating their products does indeed make us appreciate the work they do even more.
As to their products, they have chosen to focus on a few select lines, as follows:
- Extracts – either broad spectrum of full spectrum, these fluid-ounce bottles come in three different strengths (300 mg, 900 mg, or 1800 mg CBD) and three flavors (original, tangerine, or peppermint)
- Salves – offers three different strengths (300 mg, 900 mg, or 1800 mg CBD) of broad spectrum CBD salves
- Roll-ons – three different effects (Equanimity, Meditate, and Uplift) helps you set the right mood (each are 100 mg CBD)
- Softgels – two strengths (10 or 25 mg CBD per softgel, both broad spectrum) are offered
- Soaps – get clean and healthy in one motion with these two (either Sun or Moon) 100 mg CBD soaps
- Pet Chews – offers 50 chews with each holding 2 mg of CBD to keep your pet healthy and happy
As you have likely noticed by now, all of their products promote CBD and Omegas. Let us quickly explain this approach and reasoning. A common carrier oil for extracts and tinctures is coconut oil, as it has proven to effectively deliver the CBD and other phytocannabinoids to our endocannabinoid system. Hemp oil, which is oil from the seeds of the hemp plant, serves equally effectively as a carrier oil, but also contains omega-rich oils which promote brain and heart health. We appreciate this extra method of boosting our health and wellness while supporting hemp farmers in the process. For those who love to get nerdy on the scientific aspect of CBD and how our endocannabinoid system responds to it, check out their comprehensive page on hemp science.
For this review, we will focus on their CBD + Omegas Full Spectrum Extract and see what they have to say about their own products. To experience the strongest effects, we selected the 1800 mg CBD bottle for our testers.
CBD + Omegas Full Spectrum Extract (1800 mg, Peppermint)
As mentioned above, Cypress Hemp offers both broad spectrum and full spectrum CBD tinctures (if you’re uncertain about the different kinds of CBD people consume, we recommend you read our informative article, “Forms of CBD: Full Spectrum vs. Broad Spectrum vs. Isolate vs. Nano“). Since we have used other tinctures offering full spectrum CBD, we opted for the full spectrum for this review as well, for a relative comparison of results.
The ingredient list is as clean as they come, with two quality items shown:
- Organic Hemp Seed Oil – we applaud their decision to remain “holistic” by choosing hemp seed oil as their carrier oil
- Hemp Extract – this holds all the important phytocannabinoids, including CBD, which your body absorbs and uses
There was no doubt in the collective minds of our testers that this was going to be an interesting, and hopefully beneficial, product test, so with no more delay, we were ready to start our part of the review.
The CBD Informative Testing and Rating
Our readers know we rave about our third party testing facility, Level One Labs, thanks to their nearly superhuman abilities to deliver accurate quality reports. Well, they are human, as was proven during the first testing of the Cypress Hemp CBD + Omegas Full Spectrum Extract. As you likely know by now, we expect results to show a CBD content within a 10% of the CBD content as stated on the label; any variances beyond this range incurs severe penalties in the form of point deductions in this most important and heaviest-weighted category.
Third Party Test Results
We should have known upon receipt of the initial test results that something was awry. It claimed that Cypress Hemp was putting more than 50% of the amount of CBD into their extract than printed on their label, an astonishing 2,982.3 mg of CBD in their 1800 mg bottle.
This skewed and incorrect analysis ended up negatively skewing the score for the product (some of our readers may have noticed its low rating posted prior to the writing of this review, for which we apologize). After contacting the owners and explaining our rather unusual situation, Kristy and Blake immediately understood and stepped up to the plate, sending another round of samples for us to evaluate. We then sent three samples back to Level One Labs (the original product they analyzed, the original product our testers were going to try, and the new product sample sent to us by Cypress Hemp) for retesting and were blown away by the consistency between the three new reports, which clearly showed a major snafu by Level One Labs the first time around.
The final three test results indicated the following CBD contents:
- Original Batch with Erroneous 2982.3 mg CBD Content Report – now reported a 1853.95 mg CBD potency level (3.0% variance)
- Other Sample in First Batch (for Testers) – reported a 1771.22 mg CBD potency level (1.60% variance)
- New Sample Sent for New Testing – reported a 1792.59 mg CBD potency level (.41% variance)
It’s clear that Cypress Hemp proved their case (three times over!), earning them a super solid 10 out of 10 for potency!
CBD Informative Assessment
Next, here is our take on the company behind the product…
The Manufacturer – Cypress Hemp
Our interactions and experiences with the founders of Cypress Hemp are an example of the type of personal and professional attention we expect to receive from vendors of CBD products. They not only tell a fantastic story, they back it up with an ethical and moral commitment to excellence and improving the lives of the customers they are privileged to serve. It shows in their communication, their information-laden website, and their outstanding products. They promote an organic array of amazing products, and we love the organic look and feel of their website. It has more of a personal, friendly boutique ambiance instead of the typical crisp, business-like CBD shops we normally encounter.
Finally, we are pleased to rave about a company that understands the importance of quality packaging. Not only is their product presented beautifully, they go the extra step and make it all eco-friendly! They crushed it with excellent, Earth-aware packaging, which means they easily crushed the packaging factor with a rock-solid 10 out of 10.
The Product – CBD + Omegas Full Spectrum Extract (1800 mg, Peppermint Flavoring)
This is where our testers bring their expertise and experience to the table, as they sample and opine upon both taste and effects.
To start with effects, our testers were unanimous in their unbridled enthusiasm and excitement over the clearly noticeable and positive effects they experienced. There was no hesitation or doubt when it came to scoring the effects, with yet another 10 out of 10. Wow, this is the first time we have had a product get perfect 10s in the first three categories. Can they deliver the ultimate perfect 10? Let’s read on and find out!
As we noted in their section about the tincture, they offered three flavors: original (natural hemp flavor), tangerine, and peppermint. Our testers have faced some challenging flavors before, and after looking at their options, they went for the flavor they felt would be the toughest to deliver an acceptable taste: peppermint, because of its notoriously strong flavor of which a little can go on seemingly forever. Unfortunately, the taste factor took a hard hit. Our testers agreed that the flavor was an odd combo of a minty/bitter something they couldn’t quite pin down, and didn’t really want to spend much time trying! Consequently, the taste factor came in at a meager 6.0 out of 10 for taste.
The CBD Informative Overall Rating for Cypress Hemp – CBD + Omegas Full Spectrum Extract (1800 mg, Peppermint) – 9.50
Even though they scored low for taste, their final overall score for their CBD + Omegas Full Spectrum Extract came in at 9.50 out of 10, an excellent total that places them in our top tier of products and manufacturers. Our testers agreed that they would love to try another flavored extract, and believe that Cypress Hemp would score even higher the next time. Without a doubt, we wholeheartedly and enthusiastically endorse Cypress Hemp as a business who understands the needs of their clients, delivering them quality products!
