RobinInOR

Balsam peru is a pretty good sensitizer on its own - I don't think black pepper is any worse

Nothing is really comparable. Just drop it and increase another of your soft oils by the same amount (and recalc lye)

Another good anchor is black pepper - yum! Cedarwood isn't bad either.

Nope, most recipes I've tried were absolutely awful in the tub. Looked and smelled nice, but were totally unusable. Floaty little globs of yuck. If you've actually got a product that feels nice then you're luckier than most

Some other good references

http://www.oshun.ca/pchart.html

http://www.clsmith.com/wp_cosmetics.htm

Yes, I sell it. And of course it's profitable, or I wouldn't sell it It's doing well at saturday market, and it did really well last holiday.

...something in the neighborhood of 34,952 candles and made about that many soaps, too ... so somthin' BETTER sell. LOL

He he, I want to see you do inventory lol.....

Sigh, I forgot this is the weekend for paperwork - gotta close up the quarter and get everything balanced, printed and receipts stapled to the reports. It makes it *so* much easier at the end of the year, but it's *so* hard to force myself to do it.

The FDA website has your answers.

http://www.cfsan.fda.gov/~dms/cos-cert.html

I did a show where I was the only 'product' booth along with garage sale items and community group handouts, and did extremely well. And another at a park where there were only 4-5 of us and an auction, and also did well.

Interesting! I've done my own blending of my hard soaping oils, and was less than impressed with *that* outcome! It looked and burned nicely, but after the first burn it always stayed mushy. Course I was just using the oils and not a wax. Nice to see big companies trying other waxes.

The weeks are going so fast, seems like they're flying by. Still stocking up for the holidays like mad.

This weekend will be more lemongrass, an oat milk unscented and regular unscented soap, and also orange & clove. All of a sudden through work and through the website I've been hit with unscented orders - which is kind of funny 'cuz I can't sell unscented at market worth beans.

What's up with you guys this weekend - any yummy fall scents you're pouring?

I do something similar. I have a regular tri fold brochure, then a separate piece of paper that I tuck inside with a list of products and prices. The brochure can stay the same until I decide to update the pics, and I can change the list anytime I want.

The other important difference is squalane is hydrogenated squalene -

squalane is more stable and has a longer shelf life. And actually, both squalene and squalane can be gotten from olives I believe.

I have a little section for testers, and for lip balms I just have an unopened tube for each scent lined up. No one has really wanted to test the feel, they just use it for sniffing to see if they like it. If someone really wanted to use it, they usually just rub it on the back of their hand. It's too much trouble to do anything else.

Lotion I have my testers in 8 oz pump bottles (which I don't sell, I only sell 4 oz disc caps). Facial serums/cleansers I've got bottles open but I've got the dropper - I put it on their hand. Oatmeal scrub I've got another open container so they can smell and feel the texture.

Nice! Love the apple one, very dramatic.

You are right - an email isn't a legal notification - they have to send a letter.

Check your email.

Very nice indeed - I like the organized mass of color - very striking. Really like the dark brown cloths - nice change from other dark colors I've seen and sets off your candle colors nicely.

Congrats!

I've done 100% RBO, and 80/20 RBO/castor. Wasn't very fond of them at all, and I use a *lot* of RBO in my normal products. Took a long time to cure, still ended up softer than I liked and lather wasn't all that wonderful. It only has 50% of the oleic acid that olive oil has, so you didn't get the oo slime, you didn't get much of anything.

But I'm not into soaps that have to cure a long time - I think I tried it at 2 months and wasn't impressed.

I know exactly how you feel - you do great $ wise, but with so few customers, you don't feel like you really 'earned' it

Good deeds always pay off. Congrats on a good day!

You might find this article in some of your local papers as well if they pick up the AP feeds - seems our paper was focusing on fragrance today in the lifestyle section

http://www.mailtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070928/LIFE/709280311/-1/ARCHIVE

Had some interesting statistics for those of you who might be doing business plans.

Hopefully our rain will hold off for another couple of days - only 4 more Saturday market days.

Scents in the basement this week will be citrusy - lemongrass & ginger, grapefruit, lemon verbena. Also, lots of labeling - need to finish up the second box to send off to a wholesale account on Monday.

Plus whatever else Quickbooks tells me to make

What's up with you guys? Any new scents you're testing for the holidays? I might be testing a new pumpkin - hopefully I'll like it better in soap than I do oob.

You have to use soap calculators to calculate your lye (unless you just love math). Every recipe, every type of oil uses different amounts of lye. No matter where you get a recipe, you should always enter it into a calculator (like soapcalc.com or the MMS lye calculator) to verify the lye amount.

There are threads in the FAQ section http://www.candletech.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=27 that talk about calculators. And I'd suggest reading millersoap.com before you start as well

Sometimes recipes won't list the lye as a safety reason, so you are forced to calculate it yourself. Though if you're asking for problem solving, you'll list it so someone can double check your calculations.

As a general rule, hydrogenation of an oil doesn't change the SAP value by very much, if any. Hydrogenation is replacing double bonds with single bonds and hydrogen, and that's in a different spot on the triglyceride from where the NaOH splits the molecule.

Let us know how the sub of wax for pko works out.

Great story It's always hard to convince those people who say they always have to use deodorant soap brands.