mountainmadness

I do not sell or make candles. 90% of my business is soap. If you make good, unique soap you can do very well. Like the candlespastore said it takes a lot of patience, testing and time. After 6 years of soapmaking I feel like I have it mastered and am making the best that I possibly can. Our city is flooded with candlemakers but I am normally the only soaper at most of the shows... There are too many variables to know how well you would do.

If you have "walls" up around your space then you will not get relieved for a potty break by your fellow vendors.... :rolleyes2 or be able to help them out if they are alone. I always make nice with my neighbors. I think that it would look really stange to have walls up. Some craft shows are not a strict 10x10 or whatever but table space only. I have done many, many shows and have never seen what you are describing unless it is drapes to section of spaces like they do in some large shows.

I make a shampoo bar and use it also. IMO- what makes them shampoo bars are the oils, essential oils and castor oil to change the lather properties from bubbly soap to a thick lather. There is a very apparent difference in my regular bars compared to my shampoo bars when it comes to the thickness of the lather.

Santa's Nuts cracked me up too! Glad I am not the only one with my mind in the gutter.

I have been making soap for 6 years. I am now getting to the point that I could make a living off of it. Right now it is a supplemental income and plain and simply fun-money. I am planning on doing so in a year. The only potential issue that I see is budgeting myself to live on the money year round. Jan, Feb, March and April are fairly slow as far as sales but the rest of the year is busy. Grumpy had an excellent point also.... it is very easy to buy more than you really need. It is difficult to limit yourself sometimes. HTH. Jennifer

Do you mean round or soap balls? Round is achieved from using a PVC pipe in the size that you choose. Soap balls are soap that is rolled into a ball.

Christmas Bean.... or something like Vanilla Bean but with a Christmas word to replace Vanilla.... Silver Bean? I don't think those are quite right but you get the idea.

I use my standard shampoo bar for dry scalp (has castor oil in it to make it a shampoo lather). I use tea tree and peppermint EO in it. It works well, makes the dog smell great and has a lot of repeat customers purchase it.

What I have noticed with rock hard bath bombs is that all have the same concept for ingredients.... oil or butter that solidifies when it is at room temp.(i.e. coconut oil, cocoa butter, shea butter, etc.) I have spent many, many hours researching after hundreds of attempts at batches that were okay but nothing like what they sell at the stores. With that being said I have embraced the fact that I have CP down and that is the majority of my business. I do not have any desire to spend more time at this point mastering bath bombs. I order mine wholesale from Jenny and they are wonderful! You can drop one of those babies and it is like a golf ball. They sell very well and it is one less thing that I need to worry about. Good luck to all of you that continue..... Jennifer

I have one from SoapWizards. They have great customer service, back up their products and the shipping time is good also. I have ordered from them a couple of times.

Most of my FO states to use at .5oz. per lb. of oils but like everyone said, it depends on the supplier.

Soap with coffee grounds or any soap with a lemon scent.

No coconut oil in our Walmart's here but if you want a 50# container call your local food suppliers (i.e. Food Services of America, Sisco or any bakery supply store). I found a supplier in my area where I buy a 50# container of white coconut oil for $63.00 and that price already includes the shipping.

Did you add the peels at trace and not to the lye water? When I made my Citrus Peel soap I had no issues with the peels. I wonder if your peels were not dry enough. Hmmmm. You have me stumped on this one.

I bought some Christmas dish soap.. it is Pomegranate & Rose. I am not a big rose fan but the two mixed is wonderful!

If you want to start small I would suggest contacting your local churches or schools. Almost every place that I have been has some kind of craft show at one of these places. It will be fairly small and will support the community. You may also want to call your local paper and see if they have a listing of the craft shows in your area. HTH. Jennifer

Naked and just wrap in tissue and put a label on it at time of purchase. People in my area really like naked.... For wholesale accts I had custom boxes made. I realized after a few seasons that time=money so I looked at a large set-up expense but without all of the time and frustration.

IMO- I would not. I think that food preparing items should say food preparing items and the soap supplies should be seperate.

A water discount is when you use less water than the recipe calls for but the same amount of lye. The reason why people do this is to speed up the process of curing. The less the water, the less the curing time because there is less water to evaporate out of the soap. Most people cure soap from 4-6 weeks with a water discount it can be ready in 1-2 weeks. Super-fatting is the percentage of oils that are not bonded to a lye molecule. In other words, superfatting is done to make the soap more moisturizing and less "harsh". Most soapers superfat at 5% but usually no more than 10% is recommended. The more superfatting the shorter shelf life that your soap has because of the 'free oils'. IMO- if you are new to soap making I would not recommend a water discount. Unless you know your oils and FO very well it can cause seizing or acceleration that you will not be expecting. MOST recipes are with a standard 5% superfat. HTH. Jennifer

You never know until you try it.... Powdered chocolate is a great way to get a beautiful brown color. I used the baking chocolate that is in a powder form. You cannot smell the chocolate at all but is a beautiful brown and you can achieve different shades depending on how much you add.

The Pink Lemonade sounds really yummy to me! Those are some creative flavors. They look great! Jennifer

That is so strange. Did you use any new brand of oils that you haven't used before? I have an issue once with my soap cracking when I switched brands of soybean oil. Does it zap you?

I think that $6.99 is shorting yourself. You really do have a knack for it. They are just beautiful.

Your soap is so cottage-like. I really like it. I love the sugar soaps. I think that you are way under charging for those. Do you know how many total oz. the bowl of 36 is? Just by looking at it I think that between $12.00-$15.00 would be an average price.

It looks either lye heavy or that the FO that you used was not B&B safe... If it were me I would just toss it. Jennifer