soap making machine

I an thinking about buying a nice small machine for soap making, I saw prices around 1000$, my question is, where can I find a tutorial and recipes to the make it, I understand that it's a hot process soap and I only know about cp..

Wow, that is a lot of money for making a few soaps! Surely a $10 stick blender and a $30 crockpot are enough?

Well, if i go through with this, I have a customer who will Order a few thousands of bars each month. going from a hobby to a business, help anyone?

Okay, I'll ask some blunt questions that are pretty much rhetorical:

You have never made HP at all? You haven't got the experience to know that the recipes for CP and HP are pretty much the same? You are looking for a brand new recipe that you have never made so that you can see the soap? You want to make thousands of bars a month?

I'm not being overly nice here, I know - but if they are agreeing to buy something, shouldn't you actually make that product first? They might not like the HP results enough to want thousands of bars a month so it might be worth checking before you buy a machine that makes HP, ie a product that the customer might not want.

I'll just say it - if you're asking these sorts of questions, then I do not think you are in any serious position to be considering this.

I am completely wit EFG here and he stated it very well. When one first gets into soapmaking I find there are always people asking for such, but very very few follow through. Plus you need to think about the fact that hp really needs more than 4 weeks curing/drying time since they actually come out softer than cp. They take longer to dry and need to cure just like cp. You mention 1000 for the machine what about the molds? There are thousnads of recipes floating around the internet some are very good some are very bad you need the experience to know the difference. It is not simply buy a machine and start selling. I see this qite often at my markets and some do not even have the answers to simple questions about their soap. STUDY and put in your time making soap. Very few soapmakers can really make a living at it and the markets are saturated

I am reading everything I can everywhere I can right now, my customer wants me to do it for him. I'm just starting in this whole soap business, after only 2 batches of cp. I found out that machine making soap is not like hp soap but I still have no idea how to pick a right recipe that will be cost effective yet still a high quality one. Right now I'm focusing on simple hand made cp and hp soaps and that machine part is something that I want to know more about cause I couldn't find too much information.. btw that machine will do everything for u including cutting to bars, for my small understanding all u have to do is just pour in the ingredients

WOW !!! that is deep ! you only made two CP soap and plan to run top flight making over a thousand bars a month ? i am so overwhelmed about this one topic that i can not speak straight . it is not impossible to go from 0 - 60 in the soap making world , more often it is improbable given other factors. have you considered what oils you will be using , price and supplier , what is the rate your soap making inventory moves. what type bars are you planing to make . have you tested you recipe on a larger scale . i have been making soap for over two years and still do not think i am ready to sell [ that is just me ] and i have had offers .
there are so much things i could continue to touch on but i will say this : step back and watch it all in front of you , weigh your skill level at the moment and factor in how long you think it will take you to get it up to speed to create a product that you will know inside out and is sound as well . try to look at the worst case scenario, and ask your self if you can recover from that , then look at the capital you would be investing to get up and running like a Belmont stakes Thoroughbred . And when you think you thought of everything ask your self is it something you really want to do , not for money but for the love of it , because when it becomes hard to do it is easier to remember why you love it in the 1st place than thinking i am getting XYZ amount of money with ABC heartaches to go with it .

[disclamer : above comments represent my personal opinion and not a "rule of thumb per se. so therefore it should be taken as such ]

I am afraid I am going to add to the questions. You are duly warned.

How long has that customer been in business? How much is (s)he going to mark up your soap? Or are you going on consignment? Do they even have a reliable BBA market? What regulations do you need to follow to do this kind of business? You do realize that when you go to a machine that you pour ingredients in one end and get cut soap out the other, you lose the ability to call it handcrafted, right? Also, you lose the ability to finely control every detail of your soap.

And if you are asking about info and recipes, you so do not need to be jumping in blindfolded.

before i forget , i wanted to know , is the machine in question a "soap milling " machine where its pressing soap rather than making it from scratch?

Wow.. I am in shock...I don't know how anyone can even thinking about going into business after two batches of soap.

waisbrod said:

... going from a hobby to a business, help anyone?

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I actually had to step back from this thread for a bit, and decide whether to respond.

Waisbrod, you are not even at the hobby stage yet. Your first post that I can find was June 21, 2014, where you wanted advice on your FIRST batch of soap, and didn't know what Zap is. Now you've made 2 batches of CP. Neither of these batches have even had a chance to properly cure.

Now you want to go into full scale 1000/mo bar business making HP, which you said you've never made, and planning to use a machine which means your soap won't be "handmade".

I actually haven't been on this forum long, and have several years of hobby and light sales under my belt. While I wouldn't be so bold to speak for others on this forum, I am personally a bit affronted at your nerve to use these very kind and giving people, many who have spent years, if not decades at their craft, and freely offer advice based on their experience and knowledge.

(Dear Moderator - I hope this message is not offensive - if so, please feel free to delete, and I hope I don't get bounced from the Forum - Thanks)

Hello Waisbrod. From what I can gather according to the thread you posted in the following link, you made your first ever batch of soap only about 3 weeks ago or so?: http://www.soapmakingforum.com/showthread.php?t=46556

If true, then I must agree 100% with both The Efficacious Genteman and Cmzaha.

Three weeks has not even been enough time for your first batch to have properly cured yet, not to mention the extra time you'll need in order to conduct longevity tests on it to see how it fares over the weeks and months (which you should be doing if you are planning to sell).

The reason to take things slow and to not jump right into selling lye-based soap is because the nature of lye-based soap is such that problems such as DOS/rancidity, scent/color fading, and/or morphing usually don't reveal themselves right away. For example, you can have a soap that looks and smells absolutely lovely right out of the mold, but 2 months down the road the shape has warped from excess water-loss, or it has developed ugly orange spots all over it (DOS), or the scent has totally faded and the color has morphed to dark brown or some other color.

I always say that those new to the craft of soap-making should give themselves a good year before deciding to sell- a year that is well-spent in making lots of different batches of soap so that:

1) you can understand the soap-making process inside and out enough to be able to confidently answer the questions your customers will ask you;

2) you can test for quality control to see how your soap fares under different conditions;

and

3) you can give your soap out to willing testers who'll give you honest feedback so that you can tweak your formulas to be the best they can be, which in turn will give you the confidence of knowing that you are offering a quality product to your customers that they'll be happy to buy from you again and again.

Bottom line? It's my firm belief that you will come out ahead (both financially and otherwise) by investing in the time needed to first learn the craft, instead of investing so much on a machine right now.

IrishLass


Edited to add that besides The Efficacious Gentleman and Cmzaha, I also concur with what everyone else has said [a lot of people chimed in while I was busy typing away!].

Very brave, very brave )

is this a joke post? Not to be mean. But i know sometimes people on forums post fake posts to get everyone all up in arms and such. I find it hard to believe that this is real. The customer can not even try the first soap this person has made. but they will promise to invest in 1000 bars a month or week or whatever it was? And they want to buy a machine. Just tried to make soap to see if they could make a bunch of money off it? Not sure I buy all this.

If this is a fake thread, then I am grateful to everyone who posted since it gave me some insight on what to think about if I wanted to start my own business. I have 2 1/2 months of experience and I am still trying to figure out what oils I like in my soaps after a short cure.

@waisbrod: assuming you're serious, going into business after making 2 batches is foolhardy as you really do need to test the soaps out after a proper cure time among other things. You will ruin your own credibility if the soap does not meet customer's expectations and it's not like you can tell people what to expect from your soaps if you don't even know.

LunaSkye said:

it's not like you can tell people what to expect from your soaps if you don't even know.

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I do believe thats why they were asking for a recipe, so they don't have to put in any though or actual research of recipes.

Well I don't think this was a "fake post". It is very common in many countries that a son or daughter starts a business quickly without research with the support of their family. By support I mean this could be a son whose father owns a store or a chain of stores or spas or another venue that could sell a lot of soap. So the father tells the son to get the proper equipment and he will buy the soap. This is very common in parts of India as well as in northern africa.

That said I don't agree with selling soap when you really have no experience or knowledge of the process. However I doubt highly that my opinion will discourage the practice.

Obsidian said:

I do believe thats why they were asking for a recipe, so they don't have to put in any though or actual research of recipes.

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Asking for recipes is understandable if you want to gather other people's opinions, but I still stand by actually testing the soap for themselves. Some people will ask the maker how the soap was for them and that experience will help them answer the question (i.e.; "I liked how moisturizing the soap was on my skin" or "this has a good cleansing factor for oily skin, but actually use a different soap for my skin"). I wouldn't ever give a soap to anyone if I didn't know what to expect, especially since my skin can be sensitive to certain things and some of my friends have varying levels of sensitivity.

Oh, I agree with you. I just think the OP though they could get around all the foot work by asking for a ready to sell recipe. I've seen other people come on the forum with the same attitude. They want to sell but don't want to go through the trouble and expense of making test batches and expect other people to just hand over a good recipe.

I doubt they though about potential customers questions, after all, if they are mass producing they probably won't come in contact with customers. I don't bother trying to talk people like this out of selling soap, they will fail just fine on their own.

Right now this guy's company uses sells around 8000 bars a month, he's looking to cut in the cost, his supplier produce nice soaps but quite plain ones, he is the who is going to invest the money and he knows it could take some time. If it's cp or hp soaps, I don't think it will really be cost effective as he is buying a bar In less than a dollar. If no one here knows anything about these small machines, its ok I'll just go look elsewhere. My passion for soaps lies in the handmade ones, my passion for money lies on mass production for this guy. And please, if u don't have any helpfull advice, move on. With all do respect

I'm not coming here to steal your long years knowledge and experience, or ask for ready to made recipes that you worked on for years. I'm just looking to see if anyone about machine made soaps and can help me out.