Inception of a new product

When I get inspired to make a new product, the inspiration can come from anywhere, our Ginger Lime soap was inspired by dinner at a local Mexican restaurant! Ginger Lime with Avocado oil! 

The shaving bar was actually something that came to me at Market one day, why don't we have a round shaving bar with clay? It's amazing for shaving ( provides "slip/slide" factor ) since we always recommend our Murray or Casablanca soaps  ( with pink Kaolin Clay ) for guys

 that want a shave bar! 

So after the initial idea, research happens, what other things would be beneficial for the skin for a shave bar, so we decided to use Bentonite Clay, that's a great one for a shave bar, we also decided that Chamomile Extract would be great as it's known to soothe irritated skin that can be caused by shaving.  We thought a nice bright citrus would be great so scented it with Orange, Tangerine and Grapefruit.  Once I had my recipe figured out I went on to designing the label, as you can see above. 

So I've made the initial batch, just waiting for it to cure so it can come to Market. I'll also list it on my website when the time comes. 

So that's basically the process for a new product! 

Podcasts

So usually when I"m working, I like to listen to music, Pandora actually, and I have a bunch of my own personalized stations that I listen to. However, I just stared listening to Podcasts! Have you discovered them yet?
Podcasts come in all sorts of formats and they are in about any subject you can imagine! Today I was listening to one called "the Moth" which features great stories. I also like to listen to a lot of them on the topic of Handmade Business, my fave being "Dear Handmade Life" which features Delilah and Nicole talking about all kinds of handmade biz info, and they always start off with a drink they've discovered, feels like you're hanging out with your girlfriends!
There are different ways to get to the podcasts, I have an android phone so went to the the Google Play store and looked for Stitcher, downloaded that and then started listening! Give it a go, lots of cool stuff to listen to! Do you have a fave podcast?

Stamping away

I really resisted stamping my soap for a while, it's a lot of extra work, but it is a great way for customers to remember where their fabulous soap came from!

 There is a bit of a learning curve as far as knowing when to stamp the soap; if you do it too soon you wont get a clean impression, the soap will want to adhere to the stamp, if you wait too long, you'll need muscles and may still not get a good clean impression. So, if you're thinking of doing that, remember it will take a minute to figure it out! 

There are a lot of places that will do the stamps, I have always been happy with Dave at Lasercutz on Etsy. He's in the UK, but I always get my stamp pretty fast and he's great at communication. If you're looking to get a stamp made I highly recommend them!  

Studio pix as promised

So here it is, a little messy, but it is a working studio. I would never believe a space this small could function as efficiently  as it does, but it works. The key is, use your vertical space, and everything has to have a purpose!
The one new habit I have developed is to put things away immediately,  so I can use the space, not a bad thing I guess!
The one picture with all the rolling bakery racks,  you can see it but there's a bank of wooden shelves that contain all my bins of pre-measured oils.
I hope you are able to find inspiration here, I do!

Downsizing

So in August the house we were living in went on the Market. It was a lil stressful because a lot of folks were in the same boat as us and there weren't many places available to rent,  let alone places that welcomed one large dog and two cats.

We finally found a cottage in our beloved Downtown. Feeling very blessed to have found a place, the question was, could we go from a 3/2 to a cottage, and could my studio go from a large 2 car garage to a small one car garage.

The answer is yes! It's not easy at times, but I'm here to tell you it CAN be done. The picture is all of my stuff filling up the small garage before I started the transformation onto a studio.

Next post will be some pictures of what I did!