cedar_lea

Their honey is amazing

When I dabbled in selling my customers were mainly male so I did a bit if research in the area. My biggest suggestion is to choose 3-5 different scent types and try them all in small batches, put them on introductory special and see what moves. I'd go with a traditional cologne type scent, a clean type scent, a resenous scent (amber and oakmoss would go well with my boys), an outdoor inspired scent and a novelty scent. Those are the categories I've seen do best with male customers.

This is the part where I say some super generalized and probobly a little sexist observations about men and scent. Please don't be offended and take it a really generalized market research. . . . .

In my experience most men aren't fully comfortable with the idea of liking smelly body products. It's as if caring about such things will make them vain, or they believe most scents aren't for them. Your label and packaging is key. With shaving soap it's already clearly a product for men so that's helpful, but understand that they may assume thee isn't anything for them unless its obvious. These guys are most likely to go for a cologne type scent or a clean scent because its what's expected. The guy going for the clean scent may think that cologne scents are for guys that think they're ladies men, so something fresh and clean is the must have default.

But here's the thing -- men do like scent just like everyone else. I know guys that go crazy hunting for the perfect lavender or amber or get excited every time they remember how much they like apple or bergamot or something. The trick is to surprise them, make them comfortable enough to pick it up and love it. A great technique for this is nostalgia. Outdoor scents and novelty scents work well because they reference time spent doing something enjoyable. What activities are popular in your area or customer base? If you can find something that references that you could have something really big. Also ask what scents the women are buying. If the scent is something "unisex" like vanilla you may be able to dress up the packaging and sell it as is. Ask yourself "does this smell like a girl" because there will be guys who pick it up with that being their thought. If the answer is yes you may be able to add a little bit of something to make it more "masculine." Maybe that popular vanilla is soft and feminine so you blend it with a woody scent to make it harder. Maybe you shop for another scent that features vanilla but is more masculine. The point is to pass the "is it for me?" test and let them allow themselves to fall in love with it. Shaving soap is lightly scented so its a gateway scent. If you do this right you will want soap and maybe other body products because you could easily make scent addicts.

My boyfriend just told me he wants chocolate chip cookie melts. Is there a good chocolate chip cookie FO? If someone's making these I'd like to just buy them, but if I need to buy some FO and make my own . . . . Or blend my own chocolate + cookie I'm willing to break out the wax and try to find time to play. Just wanted to see what you all had to say in the subject.

Use silicone ice cube trays to make melts. I used to do this all the time when I was playing with them.

If you want a nice lightweight spray mix fractionalized coconut oil or cyclomenthecone with isopropyl mystate (IPM) I use both. Here's the link to where I leaned about it. http://swiftcraftymonkey.blogspot.com/2010/07/back-to-basics-oil-based-body-sprays.html

look up Brambleberry's Soap Queen program. She has some really good melt and pour instruction videos and some that cover all of the basics so you don't feel a little lost.

My favorate's pear. I made an awesome carmel pear blend that I love & need to play with more. I'm also wanting to play with raspberry and apple some.

Also don't be dumb and cut out the bars with a cerrated (or however you spell it) knife . . . . . not that anyone needs to be told that or makes that mistake ever . .. . *wander's away bushing*

Whew! You guys had me scared for a moment. I just placed an order over the weekend and realized I hadn't gotten anything but automated responces yet.

NG has a lemongrass that I heard some good comments about awile back. I picked some up and it smells right so far, but I haven't played with it much yet.

I pour dish soap in my jar and roll it around so that it is coating all of the sides and then rinse with really hot water until it no longer bubbles. It works so-so on plastic, but has been good on glass.

Thanks. I have Mill Creek's macintosh apple (yeah classies!) and it's got a perfumy apple scent with a crisp green note that I'm not in love with and it's nice to know that they aren't all like that.

Well I don't know if it's the same one or not, but I just picked up a clamshell from someone at a market yesterday scented with Chestunuts and brown sugar and it is delicous! Heavy on the nutty light on the sweet. Edible but doesn't screem foody.

So I was working at a Walmart the other day and somehow wondered over to the candle section. I sniffed the Green Apple tart and I have to say the scent was awesome (I hate saying that). Smelled just like fresh peeled apples. Took me back to peeling gallons of apples for applesauce as a kid.

Does anyone know a FO like this?

I am absolutely in love with thier Smooth Bourbon. The chocolate fudge icing is really strong and chocolatey. Citron is one of my favorate citruses and I was absolutely thrilled to find that they carried it.

Supplies by Star has a great mold collection. They're going OOB so they won't be around long but right now they still have alot of selection and really great prices.

I started out playing with C3 for melts, which is a container blend, because I wanted to use a supplier in town and I heard that the wax would perform the way I wanted it to.

I've had several issues figuring them out, but unmolding was never one of them. Every clam shell or portion cup I've tried I've been able to pop out easily by just pressing the bottom. I think it has something to do with the flexability and lack of stick of the plastic.

I love Ginger Souffle.

Satsuma guava is rediculously strong. I had someone send me cotton ball sniffies packaged in zip locks and the guava left an impression on all of the others. I quarenteened it to my car and it worked like an air freshener for a good 3 weeks.

I could swear I saw something like what you're describing somewhere . . . but I can't seem to remember where that was . .

I did see alot of little heart molds on etsy that seemed like what you were describing. Most of them were individual & only one for sale and alot of them were probobly a little smaller than what you'd want, but it may be worth looking at and contacting a seller to see if they can make you a few copies if you find what you want.

*sigh* wish I was more helpful. I'm sure it's out there.

In my soap with lemon zest I did get some discoloring. It wasn't bad. It just faded from bright yellow to an orange color. This was in a translucent yellow bar with some FO, althought none of it should have been vanilla.

What kind of container are you using? I use a short wide tub and after I scoop it in I take a butter knife and drag it accross the top moving product toward the center. Think of it like cake frosting if that helps.

Of course alot of texture issues are going to have to do with your recipe and the texture of the actual product.

print two copies head to head (mirrored) and a tab at the bottom. Fold the cardstock at the head and cut it out like a paper doll. attatch the tabs together at the bottom so you have a triangle. If the tabs are big enough it will stand.

I'm partial to the teal. It has a beautiful smoothness that makes the swirls feel like waves

Good luck on Drag Strip as the only throw I got was out of the bottle.

I'm actually planning on blending it with bergamont and some nice rich woody scents (I'll probobly throw in the bamboo and teak here) to make a steampunk scent and using it in M&P so hopefully it should be able to handle that. I couldn't imagine using it for much more than a fun novalty scent. Thanks for the info thought. If I decide to try putting it in tarts I'll know not to expect too much.

The cypress is from thier Nature Identical collection. You have to go into budget fragrances to find it so it can be a little tricky. The Myrrh, Neroli, Bergamont, & Camphor are too.

I agree with you about myrrh typically having a sweet maple smell. I find it soft powdery & that's what I meant was missing. I actually love myrrh. I'm just not getting it from this one. I don't know why it's like that. It's wierd.