FAQs

1. What affects the value of Agarwood?

The amount and quality of the oil inside the wood gives the Agarwood different scents leading to different selling prices. Oil inside the Agarwood wood is influenced by its origin, period of formation, where does Agarwood accumulated in the tree (stems, branches, roots), the formation process (tree alive, or a dead tree), ...

In particular, the geographic factors affect the quality of Agarwood most. The Vietnamese Agarwood is considered by experts to be the highest quality Agarwood.

2. Is the aroma of agarwood strong?

Our answer is no. Natural Vietnam Agarwood scent is quite light and spread far and tends to fly upwards. At the place where the wood is burned, you may not feel a strong incense like it was couple dozen feet away.

You should not expect natural Agarwood has strong smell as other types of incense or Agarwood with chemicals that are sold regularly in the markets.

Natural Agarwood from Vietnam is now very rare and has a very high price in the market because of its light but delicate aroma.

3. Other factors affecting the enjoyment of incense?

The aroma that we get changes in different environments: in the cold season, the scent seems weaker; the aroma will spread more strongly in a room with slight wind.

4. How many types of agarwood are there?

According to question number 1, Agarwood has many types because they are dominated by many different factors.

Currently, there is no official standard measure to evaluate Agarwood. Kim Anh Agarwood chips currently consists of 3 different types (Natural Chips, Premium Chips, Premium Plus Chips). We have enough quantity of these 3 types to provide in a long time with quite stable quality. We also have a few special types for customers wishing to enjoy the aroma of the higher quality Agarwood.

5. Is all Vietnamese Agarwood of equal quality?

Quality of Agarwood is formed from many different factors in addition to geographical factors. Therefore, Vietnam Agarwood also includes many different types and is sold at very different prices.

6. Is it difficult to assess the quality of Agarwood?

Currently, there is no clear standard to assess the quality of Agarwood. Several scientific studies have studied the ingredients in Agarwood to provide standards for evaluation, but so far, there are no specific standards.

In fact, there are many pieces of Agarwood with relatively similar chemical composition but create different scents when burned.

7. Who can evaluate the quality of agarwood?

Experimental experts often rely on experience, knowledge and a variety of innate sensory abilities to evaluate Agarwood. Therefore, the evaluation is also relative.

In Japan, where enjoying incense is upgraded into an art, there are courses on enjoying and analyzing incense. They can name woods together to create a specific scent but do not determine the true value of each type of wood (including Agarwood).

8. Could agarwood be faked?

Agarwood is a special kind of wood, and some types have a higher price than gold. This attracts many people, who have spent a lot of time to study the way to benefit from Agarwood in an improper way.

Many pieces of poor quality Agarwood have been added in color, chemical enhance the scent or lower quality Agarwood oil to look like premium one.

Techniques of counterfeiting or increasing the value of Agarwood are more and more sophisticated, many people with long experience in the industry can still misjudge the quality of incense.

The sad thing is that quite a lot of the Agarwood sold in the market has been created this way.

9. How can we enjoy agarwood?

The oil contained in each deep wood grain is the fragrance-making agent. When burned, they radiate incense. Usually people enjoy the scent by burning Agarwood chips, Agarwood powder, and Agarwood incense.

10. When not burnt, does the wood smell?

Strong fragrant Agarwood pieces are often impregnated with chemicals. Unless it is a quite high and rare one.

11. So why do the Agarwood bracelets have smells?

This is a very common question. Quite a few types of Agarwood sold today have been added with deep oil and other chemicals to make the beautiful wood grain more colorful and fragrant when smelling. With natural Agarwood bracelets that cost less than $1000, it is difficult to have the original aroma like the ones added with chemicals.

12. What factors affect the color and smell of the bracelet when we use it?

As mentioned in the above sections, the aroma of the wood is affected by heat. You can rub your hands into a deep loop or rub against the skin to help the bracelet spread smell. The natural element of each person is different, so when wearing the bracelet, the gloss and aroma of the wood grain will be different on different users.

13. Agarwood Incense Powder is powder of Agarwood Chips?

Agarwood Incense Powder is from100% Agarwood Chips ground. However, they are compounds of several different Agarwood Chips mixed in to create the best scent.

14. Does Agarwood Incense Powder from Kim Anh Agarwood contain Agarwood from countries other than Vietnam?

Absolutely not. Due to its natural properties, Agarwood from Vietnam always contains better quality of aromatherapy oil than Agarwood from other geographical areas if other conditions such as (time of formation, position of formation on trees, etc...) are not too different. Because of this difference, most of the famous incense makers in the world use Vietnam Agarwood as an important flavoring ingredient when producing high quality incense sticks. Especially incense sticks from Japan and Taiwan.

15. How is 100% Agarwood incense different from other incense sticks?

Most aromatic incense on the market are usually made of wood pulp (many types, usually not from fragrant wood), then they are soaked in aromatic oils or essential oils to create odors and various chemicals to increase odors fragrant. These aromatics or chemicals have many different types and affect human respiratory system with different degrees of negativity.

Our products include 100% wood pulp (mostly Agarwood and a small amount of Litsea powder for adhesives) and water, without any other chemicals.

16. How about the expiry date of Agarwood Incense?

Kim Anh incense sticks have no shelf life because they are made from 100% agarwood pulp. The longer you hold the incense, the more it smells.

17. Why are Agarwood Incense sold with different price?

All incense sticks of Kim Anh Agarwood are made from pure natural Agarwood powder. However, the price depends on raw material quality. The prices are higher if the materials are high quality Agarwood and vice versa. The quality of agarwood is based on some factors. Please find out more in question 1.

18. Why are Kim Anh Agarwood incense sticks usually very thin?

Our incense diameter is 1.2mm, the smallest diameter compared to all kinds of incense in the world.

To produce such thin incense sticks, we must use high quality Agarwood material, a very thin type of incense that can radiate the strong incense.

On the other hand, compared to conventional incense sticks, thin incense sticks are produced with much more stringent techniques that not everyone can produce.

19. With broken incense sticks, can we still use it or throw it away?

Incense sticks are made from Agarwood powder, when broken, they can be used as Agarwood powder again. It means that you can use it to re-produce another type of incense or put it in an incense burner to burn it and enjoy the scent.

20. What is the principle of incense burners?

The aroma of Agarwood is radiated by the effect of heat on the amount of oil in Agarwood. Burners often have a heating capacity of up to 200 degrees Celsius (392 Fahrenheit), some of which can reach temperatures as high as 260 degrees Celsius (500 Fahrenheit). When exposed to such heat, the oil in the wood will radiate incense.

21. Why should we use an incense burner instead of burning Agarwood directly with charcoal?

The first reason is to save Agarwood: with the same amount of Agarwood, if using an electric incinerator, the scent will radiate much longer than burning with the charcoal.

The next reason is the quality of the scent: the aroma emitted will be subtler because the incense burner is electrically heated without fire and no smell from charcoal.

More importantly, the final reason is safety: the incense burner is electrically heated, you do not have to worry about fire. Many premium types also have a timer function and temperature display.

22. There are many different types of incense burners, do they have the same effect in creating incense?

In addition to different design elements, different types of incense burners will affect the scent creation differently.

Before deciding to buy an incense heater, you should pay attention to the following aspects:

Maximum temperature: the higher the heat can reach the more expensive the price is. The high-quality Agarwood (usually formed in the natural environment for a few dozen years to a few hundred years) need high temperature to radiate the aroma. Essential oils or Agarwood powder can be used with at a lower heat level burner.
The structure of the burner: The burners with ceramic plates (exposed part) will have a higher price than the iron plate models. It is because they help the incense to emit more delicate smell and makes the wood last longer in the burner.

3. The quality of materials: the quality of the clay that makes up the burners also significantly affects the smell of the incense. The more expensive, higher-grade ceramic and clay kilns, the better the Agarwood will smell while being burnt.

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