My wife and i are just setting off on a journey to start a business that will enable us to work for ourselves. It seems that this is one of the better forums out there so we thought we would start here for help and inspiration.

We have managed to get our base recipe for a palm free CP soap ready and are now busy experimenting with a range of additives and oils.

We want to be as natural as possible so will be reading, reading and reading  up on everything we don't know about soap (this could take a while). If anyone can point is in the right direction for advice on natural colourants and balancing essential oils we would be eternally grateful.

A warm welcome!!!

There's quite a bit of info on the main site but there's more once you are an 'author' member.  Also, the more you post on the forum, the more boards open up to you.  Difficult to point you in the right direction and I am not sure what you can and can't see (yet) but a lot of the soapmaking general discussions might be very useful.  There is an EO/aromatherapy board too, so that might also be a useful place to look.

Good to have you here 

Welcome to the forum !

Hello, welcome to the forum 

Thank you all for the welcome,

I have a LOT of reading to do it seems and will certainly be checking out the EO stuff.

Just a quick question though, would it be alright for my wife to also post under this username or would that be a bit schizophrenic?

We are both on the journey together and if we get more boards opening up to us as we contribute to the forum it could be a bit frustrating for one if the other can't see what we are talking about - if that makes sense?

I will own up to being a bit of a sad internet geek, who spends more time than he should reading things of interest, while my wife is a bit more of a doer and keeps me on the straight and narrow with a large boot if it is needed.

  Welcome aboard! A really friendly forum here, ask lots of questions (the only thing we ask in return is lot of pics!) 

pics we can manage as we are both amateur photgraphers, though most are of the family and pets doing odd things, rather than anything useful.

Sounds familiar  


I'm sure that will be fine although might get confuzzling for the blones among us    (blones = common typo meaning blondes)

Hi there!

Don't know your names yet so can't address you properly but I just wanted to say hello.

For natural colourants, there are many many posts on here which will give you lots of information. One is here.

The most important thing to think about when selling soaps is to test, test, test your recipes. Make sure it's the best it can be before you sell it Oh, and there's the regulations to adhere to which is pretty important too!

Not sure what you know about the legal side of selling cosmetics but there is tons of information here on that too. When you're ready to sell, Scott's your man for safety assessments

Kevin x

I have been heavily reading up on safety assessments and have printed off the DTI advice on the 2004 regs. I work as a primary school teacher and have been using my co-workers as guinea pigs, we have had some really good reviews regarding lather, and the feel of peoples skin after use.

We have another 3 variations on a theme that will be ready for testing in 2 weeks, with different botanicals/clays/powders and essential oils in.

One area we are struggling with is getting the EO balance right so that the fragrance really comes to life when used, but doesn't overpower the room when it isn't being used. (Not sure that bit makes sense) So we may stick with ready mixed blends we like to start with until we (by this read Michele - my wife) get the nose right.

Oh I should introduce us

I am Ben and my wife is Michele.

The rest of the family (and pets) will no doubt make an appearance at some point.

Hello and welcome

Welcome!!! We could call you Bechelle.. you know, like Brangalina!  

Tons of info on here, I read loads and loads and then read back again because when I got to the end, I'd forgotten half of what I'd read in the beginning!!!

I don't do CP so won't be too much help on that and I'm just starting out with EOs so only learning on that front.  

Are you thinking of selling online or markets? Be warned that it could be some time before you start making money enough to actually pay one of you, let alone two (not being negative, it's the state of the nation I'm afraid).  

The more you post, the more that becomes available to you and people are adding information all the time.  And did someone mention we LOVE pics?

Hello and  welcome!

A combination of selling at craft fairs/online/ebay/local shops.

And I promise to add a picture to my profile once I find one of both of us (a bit of a rarity since one of us is usually behond the camera - in fact I might have to scan a wedding picture and it has been nearly 11 years since we got married.)

Hello and welcome to you both from another one just starting out down the soap road