# Our First Newspaper Article



## jimandpj (Mar 11, 2008)

A couple of weeks ago I got a phone call from a reporter wanting to do a story on our family soapmaking business. The article came out in yesterday's newspaper. Here is the link to the online version:

http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20090617/ZONE11/906170326/1027/NEWS0102/Family+goat-milk+soap+business+a+success

We had 3 customers come out yesterday and buy soap, and at least 5 internet orders.

Jim is only working 1 day a week off the homestead - the rest of the time he's doing soap. We're doing lots and lots and lots of craft shows, and that drives a lot of our internet business. We do very little wholesale, and focus on the retail, as it is a better fit for our family.

I just wanted to say thanks to everyone on this forum who shares their soapmaking info. The soap that we sell is our version of the walmart recipe, and the first soap that is mentioned in the article was in fact the walmart recipe (got it back from DG plus years ago). With our 8 children, I don't get to post on DGI as much as I would like, but I read a lot on here, and this forum has helped me so much with out goats and our soapmaking.

By the way - you can see one of our tanks in the bottom photo. I timed it the other day and I was able to unmold (the boys had already taken the bottom of the molds off), cut, and place on the curing racks 480 bars of soap in 55 minutes. So - just wanted to reiterate what a time saver the tank is. 

I also wanted to say that 2/3 of the people we talk to at craft shows have never even heard of goat milk soap. That's a big market to reach.

PJ


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## buckrun (Mar 7, 2008)

That is so great! The festivals are a really great way to build a business.
We have met so many wonderful people doing that- people you would never run into otherwise. 
Nice article.What a terrifically professional set up!
The bag is a nice idea- I have purchased bagged soap and then put the scented bag in my linen drawer. Congrats on the exposure!
Lee


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## tmfinley (Feb 21, 2008)

That was a great article. Congratulations on such a nice family business.

Tiffany


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## NubianSoaps.com (Oct 26, 2007)

That is a wonderful article and perfect photos! Congrats on the new sales, what a beautiful room. vicki


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## jimandpj (Mar 11, 2008)

I just found more photos they listed online. You can look at them here:

http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/gallery?Avis=B2&Dato=20090615&Kategori=ZONE11&Lopenr=906150801&Ref=PH

The goat that is being milked is India - the doe we got from Becky (Dixie Does) last year. She's awesome. 

The molds that you can see are Vicki's molds from Kelseis Creations. We love them.

PJ


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## jimandpj (Mar 11, 2008)

Lee - we love doing festivals. They're tiring, but they're so much fun. We decided on the bags because the children can do all the packaging. They're expensive is the main down side to them. And stamping them gets to be kind of boring after a while. 

I am SO happy with my new room. Up until a month ago, everything was in the house and it was getting impossible to live. Jim still has to build me three more curing racks (he's doing one today) - and then it's finished!!

PJ


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## buckrun (Mar 7, 2008)

You got the tiring part right. We keep trying to give them up but everyone keeps buying pots so we kinda haveta go ya know? Congrats on such a nice space. 
Sure miss my kiddos when I see yours all happy to help! 
L


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## nappint (Jun 26, 2008)

What a great article and what an inspiring story! Your new building looks wonderful, I'm so jealous :blush The link to the other pictures isn't working for me but I bet they are great.

When you say festivals - do you mean craft fairs?


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## jimandpj (Mar 11, 2008)

Lee - my son Colter has a saying. He uses it every time someone asks him if he likes milking the goats. It goes like this: "It's like anything else. It's fun the first few times. After that it's just work." It cracks me up every time I hear him say it, because it is just so true.

Judy - Thanks for the compliments on the building. I can't say how incredible it is to have a dedicated work space out of the house. And the goats got a portion of the building, so they're loving the extra space - which they really needed b/c we've increased the herd size. When I say festivals, I don't necessarily mean just craft fairs. We do a lot of festivals that have other craft vendors there, but they aren't craft fairs in and of themselves. The children have become really good salesmen. I just try to get us into venues where people come to spend money - not just look.

Oh, I fixed the link - it was missing a ?

PJ


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## NubianSoaps.com (Oct 26, 2007)

You ought to send Rita those photos, she would love seeing the kids all involved.

The caption said you are pushing the soap out of the mold, do you really or do you have to release it from the edges with a knife?

Also, he is using a 5 gallon bucket, how many molds do you pour at once then? The only way I can pour (well and have the soap actually end up IN the mold is to pour the first mold from the ground  does your husband pour the molds?

Sitting here just coming in from chores, I was chuckling at your sons clean white shirt as he was milking the doe in the photo  I am a complete sty.

How wonderful that this is doing so well for your family! vicki


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## jimandpj (Mar 11, 2008)

I sent Rita the article - I'll have to follow up and send her the link to all the other photos as well.

I do push it out - just like in the photo. After 12 hours, the boys go and remove the bottoms and the liners, and leave the molds upside down. I get to the soap room later - sometimes 2 hours, sometimes 6 hours and push them out by pressing with the flat of my hand along the length of the bar. Most of the soaps just slide right out. Every once in a while one will be sticky - yesterday it was my unscented purity soap. If it is sticky (and I have time) I just wait til that evening and they usually slide right out. If I don't have time I just take my putty knife and push it down on the short log end (which is the part that usually sticks) - and then it slides right down. Once the logs are pushed down, I lift the outside part off, and then the dividers out. I usually place the whole entire upside down mold, so it is sticking 2 inches off the table. This way, when I've pushed the 3 soap logs down, I can just lift up on the part of the outside mold that is hanging over the edge of the table. And then the same thing with the dividers. 

Does that make any sense?

The more I've used my molds, the more easily the soap slides out. When we order new molds from Rita, we can always tell which are the new molds because the soaps stick a lot more.

I timed it the other day - the boys had already taken off the mold bottoms and liners. I was able to get all the logs out, cut, and stacked on the curing racks in 55 minutes - that's 480 bars. I was very pleased. 

As for the 5 gallon buckets, I got a $50 pot tipper and we place the 5 gallon bucket in that. We have a scale on the ground in front of it. I place the mold on the scale, tip the 5 gallon bucket, and pour. That's usually Jim's job, but I've done it and it's very easy to do. The pot tipper is super and worth the $50. When you're pouring something with oats in it, it tends to splatter (or anything that is really accelerating splatters), but other than that it mostly goes completely in the molds with very little spillage. 

We fit 54 pounds of raw soap into the 5 gallon bucket - that's everything - oils, lye, milk, fragrance - and pour 4 molds. For us, that is 120 6 oz bars (30 bars per mold) and then we pour the rest as samples. That is a pretty full 5 gallon bucket, but it fits with enough room to blend.

I was chuckling at the photo of Cole milking into the strip cup and then the one of him showing all the beautiful milk (all 6 ounces of it) - it was a whole 2 hours after morning milking LOL. That was also a borrowed milk stand - our new one hadn't come in yet - and it didn't have a feed bucket on it, which we didn't discover until India was up on the stand and looking at us like, "Where's my food??" That's why Emery is there holding a little yogurt container of grain. LOL His nice white shirt was also a complete sham - that boy is usually filthy and stinks like a goat! People are always saying to me, "You make soap - your children must be so clean." I just laugh and say, "You're focusing on the soap part, but forgetting they spend more of the time with goats and cleaning goat stalls - they're rarely clean." 

The soap has been a HUGE blessing for our family. It's been a TON of hard work - but we've never been afraid of hard work. I'm just amazed at the number of new people we find each and every show that have never even heard of goat milk soap - such an untapped market out there. 

PJ


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## NubianSoaps.com (Oct 26, 2007)

Thanks PJ, I rush it alot more than that, I really just need to get twice as many molds so I can put off unmolding and cutting until after I have soaped the next day and not before. Won't Max and Rita be pleased 

A pot tipper....I wasn't ever going to premix my lye with water...I wasn't ever going to use FO's.....I wasn't ever going to have commerical equipment because is it really handcrafted? Well now that I am using a commercial kitchen emulsion stick blender so it can go to the bottom of the 5 gallon bucket, a tipper is certainly in the budget next! I still haven't gotten over to Michelle's to see her Tank....but that has to wait anyway for counterspace! vicki


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## Sheryl (Oct 27, 2007)

PJ, all I can say is WOW. I am impressed with your operation. That is just too cool for words. Hope you keep selling lots and lots of soap.!

You are blessed.

Sheryl


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## nappint (Jun 26, 2008)

Thank you for being so open about the workings of your business PJ, you are so inspiring to me! Not that I will ever grow a soap business as big as yours :blush but it is still really neat to see someone (some family) succeed.

I have one question about your packaging, how do you tell which soap is which? 

Thanks again!


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## jimandpj (Mar 11, 2008)

Thanks, Sheryl - this has truly been an answer to prayer, and in God's perfect timing.

Judy - I never would have imagined us having a soapmaking business. Wasn't ever something I really thought about. In fact, I remember a post I put on here asking how long it took people to sell their first 500 bars of soap. I just wanted to sell enough soap to pay for our auto repairs. But it just grew and grew! It's been a full year now. The challenges to figuring out how to do things on a large scale have been enormous, and we spend money like it's water (we'll buy anything if it saves us time - which is our main limitation). I said to Jim the other day, I NEVER thought we'd end up in manufacturing. Which is what we're doing - even though it is manufacturing by hand. LOL Inventory management alone consumes so many hours.

Judy - we hand stamp the fragrance on each bag - which means I have to buy a stamp for every fragrance we test market. I've got a huge pile of stamps we don't use anymore. LOL

PJ


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## nappint (Jun 26, 2008)

jimandpj said:


> ... I've got a huge pile of stamps we don't use anymore. LOL
> 
> PJ


LOL! I thought maybe you stamped them but then I thought "wow, what a lot of stamps that would be" so I thought I'd ask, and yup, it sounds like a lot of stamps.

I imagine you do spend a ton of time managing inventory along with everything else. I really hope that the new workshop will be a time and energy saver for you.

Oh, and one more question: I know you've only been doing this for a year but have you noticed any difference (lower or higher) in your sales with the economy being so unstable?

Thanks for letting me pick your brain!


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## jimandpj (Mar 11, 2008)

Our sales have continually risen, but that is mainly a result of our craft shows. Each show we attend, we make x number of sales. For each of those sales, y become repeat customers and z tell friends who then become customers. At each show we give away hundreds of samples and business cards, and we see a huge return from those.

We also talked to a local soaper at a recent show. They've got a retail store and have been selling soap for 5 years. He said that over that time they've sold 250,000 bars of soap. He made the comment that at that point, the business sustains itself just because there are that many of their soaps out there and enough repeat business.

But that being said - I spend a lot of my time at shows talking with other vendors. Everyone agrees that the traffic is way down and people are spending less money. I recently talked to a guy who has been vending at shows for 20 years. His wife sews little girl clothes that are incredibly adorable and well made. He told me that it used to be that $3000 was a terrible show. He said now that if you make $3000 in a show, you've done great.

I just figure that if I can start a business in this economy, I'll be set when things start to turn around. Another thing all the vendors agree on, is that the more years you spend at a show, the more sales you make.

PJ


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## buckrun (Mar 7, 2008)

Learning from other vendors is great and there are so many other factors - like your willingness to do mailings and talk with people about their results with your product. Quick shipping and etc. When we talk shows it is always so subjective because everyone has a different product- approach and ability to interact.Obviously some do better than others just because they love people.

We were at a barn burner of a show where it took both of us to pack fast enough and a lady with THE most beautiful handmade porcelain with such lovely microcrystalline glazes in soft pearly colors with a gorgeous professional display did not even make expenses. BUT- She sat at the back of her space with a paperback novel in her face and people want interaction! They want to tell the story of the people they met when they purchased at a festival- ole timey village market mentality-ancient tradition. They want to personally decide if you deserve their patronage. Your strategy of samples is great. People love to try stuff and then feel a connection to you for repeat business.

People are being more conservative yes- but they are spending wisely and cutting out the crap thank heaven! So far it has not hurt any of our shows but we are not working in an area with any job losses. 

You will build a terrific clientele with your communications and family involvement. It just feels good to people even if they cannot do it themselves.
Many of our best patrons took ceramics classes in school and loved it but could not or did not pursue it but they know what goes into it so they are appreciative and knowledgeable consumers.

Just think- soon you can send the kiddos to shows and stay home with the goats! We are seeing second generation exhibitors now- it is heartwarming. Best luck- you are off to a superior start! Business always fluctuates but you will get a dedicated following and word of mouth is your best advertisement.
Lee


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