My soaps this week..

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Soapyqueen15

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Hello!
Here are the soaps I have been working on...
Picture #1 Curing box
Picture #2 Lavender Soap
Picture #3 Peppermint soap
Picture #4 Cinnamon Orange (my fave!)
Picture #5 Citrus Burst (waiting to be cut... it smells heavenly!)

I have only been using essential oils in my soaps as I want them to be all natural. I am getting used to the consistancy that a canola/coconut blend makes as that is a new combo for me. The Orange burst, and Lavender have about 10oz canola and 22 oz Coconut and I just impatient I guess to wait 2 days instead of overnight. Because my Cinnamon Orange was ready overnight.
Does anybody know of a good online market for all natural soap? I need to sell my Christmas soaps in time for Christmas.

**Apologies to those who misunderstood my initial wording of my initial post.**
 

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Hello!
And I added some canola oil to this mostly coconut oil recipe but I don't think I like it (makes it softer than I like...).
Does anybody know of a good online (perferably cheap or free fees) market for all natural soap? I need to sell asap...

This is a joke right? :smallshrug:
 
Why on earth would you even think of selling a soap you don’t like. Not the way to go about return customers. High CO soap isn’t a good soap and isn’t a lasting soap. Canola, depending on which you use can have a short shelf life and be prone to DOS.
 
I am sorry you have misunderstood me! I need to sell soon because they are CHRISTMAS soaps! I love all of my soaps! I am saying that I like the consistancy of a pure coconut oil soap rather than a mix of oils soap. I love all my soaps. It is not that I dont love them is while I am selling them. It is because they are CHRISTMAS soaps....!!
I am going to reword my initial post. I have used only coconut oil for a while and it is fine and lasts a while. And besides color doesnt morph when you use cocnut oil.
 
What percentage of CO is your soap?
 
I am not sure but here is my basic recipe.
32 oz oil (I used for this particular batch; 22 oz CO and 10 oz Canola)
4 oz Lye
10 oz Water
(And whatever else you want to add...)
 
That’s a whopping 69% CO. The soap will be extremely drying. Your xmas customers will need a skin grafts by New Years. I would not go over 20% CO. I took an informal survey here. Almost everyone can tolerate 15%, which is what I use now. Even 15% is too drying for my face.

I do like the color of ur orange soap. What did u use?
 
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Wow, that soap would strip my skin. I like 20-25% CO. If you plan on trying to sell this you likely won’t see much in the way of return customers. Many people can’t tolerate more than 15-20%, Do you run your recipe through a soap calculator? What SF do you use. That soap would need about a 15%SF and it’s not going to last long.
 
Oh I had no idea! I found this online and it had good reviews that's why I used it. I will revise my recipe a bit.

I used soap coloring of amazon for the orange bar. It was sunset yellow and sunset red mixed. It smells amazing too with grapefruit, tangerine, and orange essential oils.

I surely hope no one needs skin grafts! Oh the mistakes of the beginners! ☹
 
Oh I had no idea! I found this online and it had good reviews that's why I used it. I will revise my recipe a bit.
I surely hope no one needs skin grafts! Oh the mistakes of the beginners! ☹

Oh, the mistakes of beginners, exactly, as shunt has said - why are you selling, you are a long way off from doing this, other people should not suffer from your mistakes. You definitely haven't thought this through, you only want to make a quick buck in time for Christmas.
 
If its any consolation, I took a class in May thinking that maybe I could sell 100% CO soap from an online recipie soon. Well its 6 mos and many-many batches later and I still haven’t perfected my soap to give away let alone sell. Ive learned so much from experimenting; and SMFers guidance, feedback and tough luv. Ooh the SMF spankings do smart.

Have fun experimenting and learning. Maybe u will be selling xmas soap another yr...
 
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I understand stand all of your conserns but for myself being a minor (under 16) and been doing this for a total of under 11 months I think you could soften your comments a bit. All it is really doing is discouraging me since I have to buy all my supplies my self from a extremly meager allowence and we dont even do Xmas so that is not a reason. I am a part of another forum for another hobby and they are much more kind in the way they word there corrective criticism posts. They understand that people make mistakes especially newbies. Please lighten up folks! I'm just a beginner. Never said anybody had to use my soap, just asking for a few kind advice posts. I am thinking of leaving this forum btw, I can figure out my business alone as well as not.

If its any consolation, I took a class in May thinking that maybe I could sell 100% CO soap from an online recipie soon. Well its 6 mos and many-many batches later and I still haven’t perfected my soap to give away let alone sell. Ive learned so much from experimenting; and SMFers guidance, feedback and tough luv. Ooh the SMF spankings do smart.

Have fun experimenting and learning. Maybe u will be selling xmas soap another yr...


Thanks, at least someone understands.
 
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I understand stand all of your conserns but for myself being a minor (under 16) and been doing this for a total of under 11 months I think you could soften your comments a bit. All it is really doing is discouraging me since I have to buy all my supplies my self from a extremly meager allowence and we dont even do Xmas so that is not a reason. I am a part of another forum for another hobby and they are much more kind in the way they word there corrective criticism posts. They understand that people make mistakes especially newbies. Please lighten up folks! I'm just a beginner. Never said anybody had to use my soap, just asking for a few kind advice posts. I am thinking of leaving this forum btw, I can figure out my business alone as well as not.

As a new soaper myself, I think your ambition and enthusiasm is wonderful, but your desire to sell is premature. I don't think anyone's intention was to offend you, but these people have been soaping for years and they know how difficult it is to start a business and take care of all the things involved. You need insurance, you need licenses, and you really really need more experience. At 16 years old, you have lots of years ahead of you to figure things out. Truly your soaps need a good long cure and a good long test period by you to determine if the recipe is ready to be sold.

Forums are a great place to gain knowledge, ask questions, and understand mistakes that you're making. I think the harshness of comments comes from their own experiences of getting burned as well as how many people come to this forum having made soap for very little time and claiming they are ready to sell. It takes people years to perfect this craft and it does sting a little bit when you've had so much experience and so many failures to learn from and someone walks in thinking they've got it down.

I think you should take their advice within the context of their experience. No one will sugar-coat things for you here, so if that's what you're looking for, you may want to try another forum. But from experience, I can tell you that there are few places where you'll receive such true and honest criticism. They're being extremely open with you and offering suggestions on how to alter your recipe, something that probably took them a long time to master. Not everyone will so willingly offer information that was hard-won.

Here's my final advice: try not to be so defensive. And try to grow a thicker skin. The criticism offered here is not an insult on you personally, rather it is constructive criticism offered with the intention of helping you improve your craft. You can either take the criticism and work with it, or you can write it off as rudeness and risk your future business opportunities. It's up to you, but you came here for a reason.
 
Sorry you are getting your guard up. Go read in the rules, announcement section. There are a couple stickies with the tone of the forum and other facts.

You came here and flat out asked about selling. You never posted your recipes asking for help.

Many here, me included have been making soap for quite some time and sell. We have spent a lot of time and money to have a business. Unfortunately when a newbie comes along with a terrible recipe and says they are going to sell we take offense. A customer purchasing one bad bar of soap will then never try another one.

I’ve had browsers say they tried handmade soap and hated it. We are extremely passionate about what we do and want to protect the integrity of what we work so hard to do.

What we make can harm someone if not done correctly. That is the point we are trying to get to you. I’ve asked if you zap tested your soap and got no response, I also asked if you ran your recipe through a soap calculator with no response.

So, you see, even when trying to help, you avoided the questions. So, You got the responses you got

If it’s really cost prohibitive, you may want to take a step back and save up some money so you can get what is needed to make a nice bar of soap. You can make a good bar of soap just with grocery store purchased items.

Take time to learn the process. Enjoy it.

Also, to sell you need to have insurance and may need a business license or other things depending on where you live.

You say you’re 16, are you ready to have your parent loose everything if your product harms someone?

Nobody is telling you not to make soap, we are just telling you that you are not anywhere ready to sell.
 
It sounds to me like you took a very hands on approach to soap making, which is totally fine, you learn a ton by actually making the soap, however i think you are missing an important part and that is all the research needed to make good soaps.

You said you didnt know the %, nor that too much CO can be drying, so my advise is to step back. Start by reading all you can about soap makig. Read a ton of pages on this forum. Learn why you are using which oils. Then come back to the actual soap making. Have you tried your soaps on different seasons? Some will be more drying in winter (like the high CO ones), how about in summer? How long does your eo is lasting on the soaps? Those are things you can only answer after making this for quite a while, and while 11 months is a while, you still need a bit more knowledge.

People are reacting like that because there are a ton of people selling bad soap and that makes us all look bad. If someone buys your soaps with such high CO, they will probably think that all handmade soap is super drying and wont buy again. That affects not only you, but soap makers and sellers in general.
It is great that at 16 you want to start your business, just make a bit more planning and researchig. Good luck.
 
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Thanks everybody. Sorry
I know there is alot to learn... Because you say I didnt respond to if I have zapped(?) my soap recipe and honestly I dont know what that is....! I have made my own recipe before using a Bramble Berry soap caculator...
Thanks for the encouragement tho.
 
Thanks everybody. Sorry
I know there is alot to learn... Because you say I didnt respond to if I have zapped(?) my soap recipe and honestly I dont know what that is....!
.
If you don't know what that is, that's because you are still a beginner, if you are someone who is selling, you would know this, so go do a search and find out, better still read all you can by going back in the beginners forum.
 
You also need to understand that nobody knows your background, no one knows you are a minor, no one knows you've been soaping for 11 months, people just respond on the basis of the post, taking it at face value
 
Thanks everybody. Sorry
I know there is alot to learn... Because you say I didnt respond to if I have zapped(?) my soap recipe and honestly I dont know what that is....! I have made my own recipe before using a Bramble Berry soap caculator...
Thanks for the encouragement tho.

A zap test is a way to test your soaps are safe and not lye heavy. Test all your soaps before you use them. Here is how: How To Properly/Safely Conduct The Zap/Tongue Test
https://www.soapmakingforum.com/ind...rly-Safely-Conduct-The-Zap-Tongue-Test.63199/
 
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