Buying other people's soap

I absolutely love trying out soap made by other people. I have just purchased some of Auntie Clara's soap. I am so excited as I have been wanting some for a while, but had to save up until I could afford the international postage. I have ordered six of her bars. I am sooooo excited to try them!!!! Do any of you purchase other people's soap? My hubby thinks I'm crazy because I make it myself, but nothing beats trying something made by someone else, it's like getting a restaurant dinner rather than cooking your own, something just a little bit special.

I do! The last two times that we went on vacation (or 'on holiday' to those over the pond), I bought a small handful of bars of handmade soap that I found at one of the little family-owned shops not too far away from our time-share. The soaps turned out to be really good. As a matter of fact, I just got done using up the last of the bars yesterday, and now I'm looking forward to our next vacation when I can buy some more! lol Hopefully, the shop will still be stocking them on our next visit.

I've also tried other's soaps by doing soap swaps. To me, it's always an exciting treat to try other's soaps.


IrishLass

Sadly my favorite soap maker has disappeared into the ether, she used to have a booth at the local renaissance festival, and I worked for her one year- and then the next year she was just gone, and I'd never gotten any sort of contact information about her otherwise ):

I do find it extremely exciting to try other peoples soaps though!

Haha, I do this ALL THE TIME! My parents and in-laws were initially quite puzzled when I asked them to buy local handcrafted soap for me whenever they travel. I just love checking out other soapmakers' work, it's so fun and inspiring.

I've built up a good-sized collection of soaps that I didn't make. I like to cut off a small piece of the bar to try out and save the rest, including the label, where I note the date I bought/received it. I'll often cut off another piece several months later to see if it's changed.

I love trying out other soapmakers' goodies. I am now much more discriminating about what I'll buy at craft fairs/shops though. I still buy, but now I can recognize who has really nice stuff.

I loved participating in the last swap here and seeing all the wonderful thing everyone has been creating.

You'll have to report back on Auntie Clara's soaps... I'm such a fangirl of hers! A friend is South African, and I just missed begging him to bring me some back the last time he went home to Cape Town.

Oh Wow, I can't wait to hear what her soaps are like! I'd love to do the same but the postage is too much for me right now. What soaps did you order?

I do too! Having never tried it, had to buy some tallow soap from a couple soapers on Etsy, and am SOOOO impressed by one of them, a lovely naked deer tallow bar with faint but wonderful lavender and mint EOs. I will order from her again even when I have tallow soap under my belt. Ordered an Aleppo bar from Syria from an Etsy seller in France, can't wait to find out next week what the raves are all about. And I often buy from farmers markets and festivals if something looks really, really nice. Lots of mediocre soap out there, but love to try really good stuff, and love to give feedback on it

I have bought -

Rock shandy (it sounds really interesting and the scent blend appealed)

Violet (my ultimate favourite fragrance and I bet she has chosen a wonderful version)

Carnation (someone asked me for carnation soap at a craft fair recently as his wife loves it and her favourite brand is discontinued. Clara has used a blend to mimic the carnation scent)

Buchu soap (I've never heard of it and likely won't ever get a chance to try it again)

Princess Alice (the floral blend appealed to me)

Nkandla shower soap (contains cognac so seemed really interesting)


I so jealous of your proper Syrian Aleppo paillo, I'd love to get my hands on some!

I have a few other soapmakers on my list to try too!

Here's where I ordered the Aleppo soap, very reasonable shipping too. I wish it were possible to buy directly from soapers in Aleppo, but alas, it looks like the city is totally bombed and largely abandoned. So hoping this can one day turn around and give these people back their livelihoods.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/258078918/soap-of-aleppo-170gr-syria-alepia?ref=listing-shop-header-0. Will let y'all know what I think of it, and if anyone else has good sources, would love to try more from other sellers across the big pond.

Another source for Aleppo soap is 'Nature et Decouvertes' in France. Search pain d'alep on their website. I got some of the 35% stuff last year while i was in France on holiday.

So yes i like trying other peoples' soaps too!

I absolutely buy soap from others, but consider it economically advantageous. While I do make my own, I do not sell. This limits the myriad of things that I can practically try. More importantly, it can be disproportionately costly and time-consuming to make a single bar to test. It takes almost as much time as making a batch and is annoying to order ingredients to "try".

I employ the same logic in eating out. I find it to be easier and cheaper to simply purchase novel menu items. If a restaurant is known for it's tuna burger, I'll try it there first. If I find that tuna is simply not a meat that I enjoy in burger format, I have saved myself the time and effort of deciding on a recipe, grocery shopping, and preparing a meal that I end up hating. If I love it, I have a more informed opinion about how I want to tweak my version.

Likewise, there are sometimes new ingredients in soap making that I have not played with. Auntie Clara has a bile soap in her shop that fascinates me. She claims that it is a superior stain remover. I cannot even imagine how much of a PITA it would be for me to figure out where I can get bile from or what it would cost if I did. Even if I randomly had some floating around in my pantry (which would raise a lot of eyebrows), there is bound to be a learning curve to working with a strange ingredient and formulating a recipe. That takes time, effort, materials, etc. It only makes sense to try hers first, expensive postage and all.

If it is soapy magic, it gives me a benchmark to strive towards. I'll gladly spend months trying to replicate or improve on her version. If I hate it, I am only out the cost of the one bar of soap. Even if it is really expensive soap, I cannot imagine that that is not a significant savings. There is nothing I hate more than making a herculean effort to get lackluster results. Whether it's a soap, meal, or other DIY project...it just feels like such a waste of materials, time, and money.

I know that there is value in the learning experience, but feel that trying out others' products hones my editorial process. It also gives me a measurable metric for my results. Otherwise, I might go running around thinking that I was the best at everything:grin:.http://www.soapmakingforum.com//www.pinterest.com/pin/create/extension/

Look what came today!!!!!! Excited is a understatement!

I would, but I don't think I'd buy 6 sweetie. That's ok, hopefully you'll love all six!!

I had to buy them from South Africa so I had to buy several or the postage just wasn't worth paying. I'm sure I will love them, they smell fantastic.

I do, but not over the web. Only if I can smell it in person! I don't very often, b/c it has to be something that really grabs me.

Saponista said:

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Look what came today!!!!!! Excited is a understatement!

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Ooooh! What did you get!? I love her.

If you go back up the post a bit I wrote which ones I had chosen. So far I have only opened the carnation one. The packaging is so lovely I didn't want to open them all yet!

In the past year I have tried some other peoples soap for comparison to my own recipes. The other reason I've ordered others soaps, was also to try the fragrance before buying the FO. It serves three purposes - I get to try any soapers soap for lather, bubbles, etc. comparison, get to know if I like the fragrance enough to buy the FO to use myself, and lastly, just to live with someone elses soap for a while.

I also like the idea of supporting those people who have been generous with their on line videos, sharing information, so I will continue to order soap periodically to support those people and to try new scents.

I too buy other peoples soap. I just ordered two beautiful bars from Germany (they'll be delivered to the German office and a colleague will bring them stateside next month). I've purchased from Shunt here - and will buy again when my stock runs out - and have a few others bookmarked to check out. I post reviews on my blog.

What's the link to your blog amd?