Small Batch, By Hand: The Family Behind Seaside Naturals' Fabric Spray

If you've ever flipped a fabric spray bottle around and wondered who actually decided what goes in it, the honest answer for most big-name products is: a corporate fragrance house, working from a formula that's changed hands more times than anyone can count. At Seaside Naturals, the answer is different. It's Linda, her daughter Katelyn, and their longtime friend Brittany, mixing small batches by hand in Malibu, California, using four ingredients they can each name from memory. That difference in scale is the whole reason our Lavender Linen Water Spray has a four-ingredient label instead of a single word like "fragrance."

Who's actually making this stuff?

Seaside Naturals started in 2003, when Linda, a massage therapist with a background in nutrition, got tired of buying cleaning and freshening products she couldn't fully explain to her own kids. So she started making her own. What began as jars mixed on a kitchen counter grew into a real company, then went through the kind of setbacks a lot of small businesses face, then came back stronger when Katelyn and Brittany joined her to rebuild it from the ground up.

That's still who runs it today: three people, one Malibu-based operation, no outside fragrance lab involved. When we say "family-run," we mean the people whose names are on the ingredient label are the same people answering customer emails.

What does "small batch" actually mean?

It's a phrase that gets used loosely, so here's what it means for us specifically. Small batch means:

• We mix limited quantities at a time instead of running continuous industrial production
• Someone on the team checks scent and consistency on every batch before it ships
• We can swap in organic or higher-quality raw ingredients without renegotiating a supply contract with a chemical manufacturer
• If something's off, we catch it before it reaches your door, not after a customer service escalation

The tradeoff is real: we sell out of sizes sometimes (our 8oz and 16oz Lavender Linen Water are currently sold out while we catch up on production). But the upside is a formula we can actually stand behind, ingredient by ingredient.

How is that different from how Febreze is made?

Febreze is manufactured by Procter & Gamble at industrial scale, in facilities producing millions of units. That scale is exactly why its label can legally say "fragrance" instead of listing what's in it. Under the U.S. Fair Packaging and Labeling Act, fragrance formulas are treated as trade secrets, so a manufacturer can bundle dozens of individual compounds under that one word without disclosing them on a U.S. label. (Notably, Febreze sold in the European Union does list specific fragrance allergens like linalool and limonene separately, because EU law requires it above certain concentrations. The U.S. version doesn't carry that same requirement.)

That's not an accusation; it's how the mass-market fragrance industry works, and it's legal. But it does mean a mass-produced fabric spray and a small-batch one are built on fundamentally different levels of transparency. Ours lists four named ingredients because we only use four, and because at our scale there's no fragrance house standing between us and the bottle.

Why the Malibu part matters

We're not based in Malibu for the postcard. Being a small, local operation means the same three people sourcing lavender essential oil are the ones deciding whether a batch is ready to ship, with nobody upstream diluting the formula to hit a cost target. It's a slower way to run a company. It's also the only way we know how to keep the ingredient list this short.

Our Lavender Linen Water Spray is a good example of what that looks like in practice: distilled water, a biobased solubilizer, organic ethanol from sugar cane, and Lavandula hybrida (lavender) essential oil. That's it. Lightly mist it on sheets, pillows, towels, or guest linens before bed for a soft, floral scent, without a synthetic fragrance blend doing the work.

Frequently asked questions

Is small-batch production actually better than mass production?

Depends what you're optimizing for. Mass production is more consistent at scale and usually cheaper per unit. Small-batch trades some of that scale for a shorter, more transparent ingredient list and closer quality oversight, since the people making it can catch problems batch by batch instead of leaning on standardized industrial controls.

Why does Febreze just say "fragrance" instead of listing ingredients?

Because U.S. law (the Fair Packaging and Labeling Act) allows fragrance formulas to be treated as trade secrets, so manufacturers can list "fragrance" as a single ingredient rather than disclosing the individual compounds. That's legal and standard across most mass-market scented products, not just Febreze.

What's actually in Seaside Naturals' Lavender Linen Water Spray?

Four ingredients: distilled water, 100% biobased solubilizer, organic ethanol (from sugar cane), and Lavandula hybrida essential oil. No synthetic fragrance.

Is Seaside Naturals really family-run, or is that just branding?

It's literally three people, Linda, her daughter Katelyn, and their friend Brittany, running the company out of Malibu, California. No outside manufacturer in the mix.

Where can I buy the Lavender Linen Water Spray?

Directly from us at seasidenaturals.com/products/lavender-linen-water-spray. A 4oz bottle runs $15.

Sources referenced: FDA, "Trade Secret" Ingredients and FDA, Fragrances in Cosmetics