BLSoaps

They look great! I especially love the label on the lip balm! I'm always playing around with my lip balm labels. I never seem quite satisfied with mine. I love yours. Simple, elegant... Very nice!

From the details in the original post, I don't see anything that would stand out to me that makes this inquiry sound like a scam. As long as she covers herself on how she receives the funds (and I'd definitely insist on everything up front, and probably going a step further and having it be a wire transfer, instead of a credit card), I don't see any problems. I get wholesale requests frequently, many of them sounding exactly like this. Some pan out into wonderful wholesale accounts. Others just end up disappearing into the ether and I never hear from them again. If the original poster is interested in seeing the wholesale terms letter I send new inquiries, please PM me. I'd love to know why you think this is a scam. If it's the broad range for minimums, that's actually quite normal. They're looking for price break points. I was recently asked to price out my soaps from orders as small as 300 and as large as 1200 bars. It took some fun math crunching, and it was wild to see how I could tweak the numbers around to come up with better prices, but asking for price breaks for higher quantities is very normal. IMO, it often shows that the person inquiring is a serious buyer. If someone thinks they can sell a thousand units of one of my products through their store, that's awesome!

With new wholesale accounts, I always require payment in full up front. I do let them know that once we have several orders behind us, as long as everything has moved smoothly, we can then talk about half down, and half on delivery. I'm also hoping that down the road I'll be in a position to start being able to do Net 30. (That's when I'll know I'm really playing with the Big Boys!) And I decide when to switch to half down, not them. They can ask about it, but the decision is mine alone. I've never had anyone complain about requiring payment up front though.

While I love spam filters, I also have days that I hate them as well. I'll have friends and customers email me with no problems, then all of a sudden, their mail will start going to my junk folder. I luckily check it and clear it about once a day. It keeps the bulk down, but also guarantees that e-mails I was supposed to actually get don't get dumped accidentally. Just a little FYI tip. Spam filters are far from perfect. They don't catch all the spam, and some things that aren't spam are accidentally viewed as such.

She might mean tulle, which is available at a lot of craft stores, wedding supplies, fabric stores. You could probably even find it precut into circles for you. Saving you tons of time, and if you're like me, probably a lot of aggravation! I know some online stores (Nashville Wraps???) sells it precut in circles. Okay, just looked at Nashville, and didn't see the circles, but I know someone carries them. But here's a picture of their larger roll of tulle. Tulle Circles: (google search - tulle circle - LOTS came up) http://www.papermart.com/templates/44-9-29.htm?GOCMP=Papermart%5FCampaign+%231&GOMTC=Exact&GOKEY=tulle+circle#GO_44929 http://www.save-on-crafts.com/tulciron.html

You'd have to have a fairly thin lotion for this to work. You'd have to be able to shake it up pretty thoroughly in the bottle for the FO to blend in thoroughly. Also, you'd have to leave a space at the top of the bottle so you'd have room to shake. I saw this done in a shop at Pier 49 (is that the famous one?) in San Francisco last summer. And honestly, the idea intrigued me. But the partially empty bottles looked tacky on the shelves. If you used white bottles (they used PET), you could hide this much easier, but being able to see this inch of empty space at the tops of the bottles, it was just tacky. Easy solution for just having to make up one bottle.... Weigh out your lotion (4 oz, 8 oz, whatever you need), with a little bit of extra, into a zip lock bag. Add your FO. Then smush it to death. I actually love doing this. It's mildly theraputic. I need to do it now so I won't threaten to kill my kids. They're driving me nuts today. Anyway.... you then clip off a corner, and squeeze it into the bottle. If you lay the bag out on the counter when you're almost done, you can flatten it out, and get almost all the lotion out by sliding the side of your hand across it, and getting all the stuff that was left behind. I hope that made sense. My kids are fighting around me. I'm just desperately waiting for my husband to get home so we can leave (bbq at the grandparents tonight).

I can't quite wrap my head around why glycerin would add any kind of lathering abilities. It's a humectant. The only thing I can think of is to compare it to how adding a little sugar to the lye water for CP soap helps the lathering of the final soap. Glycerin is sweet.... :undecided ... I'm probably just talking out my .... um yeah. I'm stretching here! LOL! Other than adding some kind of a surfactant, I don't believe there is anything you can add to an already made shower gel base that will make it more bubbly. If I'm wrong, then I'll happily be wrong! But I can't think of anything. If you are making a natural liquid soap to use as a shower gel, the oils used make a HUGE difference in the lathering abilities. If this is something that interests you, I'd strongly recommend Catherine Failor's Liquid Soapmaking book. I don't use her methods for making soap, but her info in there on creating recipes, what oils do what, etc, it's invaluable. As for adding Shea Oil to a premade shower gel base, while it will help it feel more moisturizing to the skin, it will dampen the lather even more. It will basically be free floating oil in the shower gel, which always lessens the lather that you'll get.

That's a high percentage of e-wax. I'd guess that's where your drag is coming from. The glycerin would make it feel sticky or greasy if you used too much. When I use too much glycerin, my hands feels greasy, and are super shiny until it manages to soak in. Glycerin is wonderful in tiny amounts, but not so much (IMHO) in larger amounts. I also don't know why everything but the e-wax is by weight. Everything should ALWAYS be by weight with B&B recipes.

I just asked my webguy if he can create something like this for us. It'd be awesome if he could. As it is, I've answered this 'how do I calculate fo' question several times already just today. LOL!

Hi Valerie!!! When I measure out for small quantities (well, actually, I now have a mini scale that measures in 0.000 grams, it's awesome!), this is how I calculate it. You've got 16 oz of lotion. I tend to actually use less than 1% of FO (I like 1 oz per gallon as a ratio), but we'll stick to 1% for the instructions here. 16 x 0.01 (1%) = 0.16 oz Then plug this into the Google Search Bar... 0.16 oz to ml It will calculate it for you, and for this equation, you'll get 4.73 ml. The pipettes that are coming with the order have milliliter markings on the side. You'll measure out as close to 4.7 ml by volume using these markings. Since they only go up to 3 ml, you'll do two runs on it. Volume isn't nearly as accurate as weight, but for things like this, it's still pretty accurate. If you have any questions, just holler!

I agree! Having too many scents just makes it harder for them to decide. Think how easy it is for you to decide if someone says 'pick between A & B'. If you suddenly add in, C, D, E, F, G, H....Okay, you get the idea, I'm sure. Basically, if you offer them too much selection, they are more likely to just toss their hands up, and walk away because they can't decide. Inevitably, someone will ask you for that one specific scent that you happened to have left at home. Simply offer it available to order. If they're local, offer free shipping or delivery. I'm just as much of a scent junkie as the next person on this forum. But for my website, I purposely limit what I offer. I'll usually keep a small set of year round scents, our best sellers. And I let myself play every season with seasonal scents. I still get to feed my scent addiction, but I don't overwhelm my customers with too many choices either.

If you schedule a pick up, all you have to do is present it personally to your carrier. So you can't just leave it on your porch to be picked up, but you also don't have to drive downtown and stand in line either. I ship out internationally all the time now that they've set up the discount for doing so online. I never go to the post office if I can help it.

MEAN MEAN MEAN!!!! I just ordered 25 lbs of Shea Butter and picked up several gallons of Olive Oil. I needed that more than I needed the cartridge. But I know I shouldn't put it off too much longer. I've book marked the link. Hopefully it'll still be on sale. And if not, it's still a decent price for their regular prices. I love newegg!

I've had castile soaps take several days to set up (my kids found one of them after 24 hours, and trailed their fingers through the tops.... ). But most recipes, this isn't normal. But without knowing the details of your recipe, it's really impossible to tell. Can you share more details?

PS - my plumeria was from Tony's. I still love the stuff, I just keep it to non soap products. I've got a few disappointed customers who really wanted it in soap. Instead, they usually go with an unscented soap and then use a variety of the Plumeria B&B stuff.

Most Plumeria FOs don't behave well in CP soap. They tend to seize drastically. I tried several times, and always ended up with instant soap on a stick blender. Completely unusable except for a trash can scenter.

I don't know if you moved this to another section or not then, but I've never seen or heard of these being available from anywhere but a cosmetics supply company. I also know with they cyclomethicone, you're going to run into shipping issues. It's flash point is less than 200 degrees Fahrenheit, which has strict shipping regulations attached to it, especially when dealing with international shipping. I hope you're able to find something that works though!!!

I have the 2600n, and use the waterproof vinyl labels (OL175LP) and clear gloss (OL175CL) from www.onlinelabels.com. There ARE some tricks to getting them to work though. It needs to be on the Transparency setting. And you have to feed the label in from the outside port (you can't have the paper in the regular paper tray). Also, if you print too many pages at a time, and the machine gets overly warm, they'll start blurring again. Since I'm only printing a couple sheets at a time (I purposely make sure I space out my printing, even when I'm doing a lot), feeding it from the outside feed slot isn't really an issue. You get used to it. But I LOVE this printer. It's been wonderful. And speaking of which, I need to price out a new black cartridge. Mine is finally getting low.

My husband won't even touch my lotion pots to clean them. Heck, he won't even touch a container with clear liquid in it for fear it might be lye! He knows to :tiptoe: around my stuff! LOL! But then again, he's been trained for 8 years with me, and 4 years with all the business stuff.

PayPal is different from PayPalPro, which is their merchant account. With PayPalPro (PPP) you would have access to their virtual terminal. As long as you have a computer with internet access, you can have it process everything right then and there. This is the info you'll need from your customers... Name on Card Billing Address City, State, Zip Full Card Number Expiration Date CVV2 (3 digit code on the back) If any of this is incorrect, it will decline the card. If you don't process on site and just collect this info, make sure to get phone number and e-mail to follow up if necessary.

Any kind of a lotion or massage oil can be used for a rub. It's going to be the EOs that you add (or other herbal ingredients can be used as well) that will make it pain relieving. You'll need to research them carefully, though, because the ones that will help with the pain are very strong oils, and have to be used carefully. I'm blanking on the different EOs at the moment... Peppermint Black Pepper Eucalyptus, I think... Ummm.... someone help me tired brain???

I definitely want to hear how it works for you. I keep contemplating making a master batch, but it starts to resolidify when cool, and I was worried about heating/cooling/heating/cooling too often. However, I'm making soap often enough now that I, too, am tired of prepping each batch separately. So let us know how this works for you!!!

I think since so much shopping now IS virtual, people are much more likely to make that plunge (buying something they haven't held, touched, smelled, tried) than they were even a few years ago. For me, as a shopper and an online seller, I've found two 'ingredients' are crucial to making successful sales. One - clear, professional and appealing product photos. Since they can't hold your product, they need to visualize it as best they can. A good photo helps draw them in. Two - good product descriptions. A lot of times, people get stuck in the mentality that shorter ad copy is better. That's because before the internet, they had to pay for all that space. And they weren't trying to close the sale, they were just trying to get that customer into a store, and then the sales people would close the sale. Since you don't have that, you need to start and close your sale all in your ad copy. So longer, as long as it's not rambling and wandering, is better. You need to make sure to answer their questions about your product since they won't have you immediately there to answer. Make sense? I'm recovering from a migraine, so I'm still a bit foggy. Most visitors when they come to your website won't read all your ad copy. But most visitors won't actually be purchasing either. They're essentially the tire kickers (borrowing from car shopping - those who come into the lot, kick the tires, look around, but never actually buy). Your ad copy isn't written for them. It's written for those that are actually buying. And I'm getting rambly myself! LOL! You need to make sure you write good ad copy to describe the product, the scent. Make it appeal to them in the ways that their other senses would have been appealed to had they had the opportunity to actually hold/see/smell/try it.

I honestly had the same concern, but she said the company she originally researched to contract with said it wasn't a problem. I've done quite a bit of floral arranging myself over the years, but the last thing in the world I need right now is to add one more thing to my plate! You should have seen the evil look in DH's eyes when he could see that I was contemplating it! LOL! I hope she's able to make a go of it! I know she's going to move into it slowly, and work out kinks like this as she goes.

I do drastic discounts on my castile soap. I only make 1 castile soap, and it's got Lavender EO in it, which is definitely not a trace accelerator. I only use enough water to make sure my lye dissolves. (so if I'm 12 oz of lye, then I'll use between 12 & 14 oz of water) Even with this steep discount, it still takes forever to trace. The last time I made it, it was with a brand new mold. I poured way too early, and had leaking issues. It was a PITA. But it shows my impatience with castile! LOL! Anyway, as long as your FO isn't a trace accelerator, you should be okay doing a discount. If you're not sure, then don't do a discount the first time, and then discount on your next batch if it turns out well!