I'm glad it's October

Mostly because that means that September is OVER!!! It was an absolutely crazy month. Some of it good, some of it bad, all of it insane.

To start with, we moved. The bad news: We moved, I'm still living in boxes, and we moved. Good news: We LOVE the new place! It's an older house with lots of storage. And I have tripled the space that I have for the business. Can we say YAY!!!

The 'oddest' feature of the house is what actually makes it invaluable to me. It has an unfinished 2nd kitchen. So it's got the counters & cupboards, but no sink and no appliances, but still! I'm just thrilled! Here are a few pictures of it! (all of these were taken within the first few days after we moved in)

(I share the room with the washer & dryer, but it actually helps keep me caught up a little more on laundry, lol) Those are now scooted back against the wall. The cement was still wet when we first moved in)

(the room is just huge! It's roughly 15'x15')

(we actually changed around the table set up after getting everything in there. I'll probably take new pictures once I actually get everything organized)


Then I have a 2nd room (also 15'x15') that will be my office/shipping room. I'll keep all my finished product in here, along with my shipping supplies. I have a 2nd table set up in here for shipping orders.

The black shelves are holding all of my wrapped soaps. The white shelves (and other black shelves) are now filled with the rest of my product. I will probably need one more set of shelves to hold everything & not feel crowded though.

This is A LOT more organized now! LOL! We're still figuring out the homes for everything, but it's coming along nicely.


But this honestly is what I lived with for nearly 2 weeks after moving in. I was constantly digging through boxes to find everything I needed. It was NOT fun!!!


And I also have this wonderful space to store bulk oils, cases of containers, show supplies, etc. I DO have to share the space with the rest of the family (darn them for wanting to store their crap in here too!!!), but it's still an invaluable space to have!


So there is a quick recap of the first 3 weeks of September. Trying to get everything moved over & moved in! (heck, we're still working on the moving IN part, lol)

Then I had a big show up at Sundance Resort the very last Saturday of the month. So I had to PREP like mad for that when I should have been unpacking, organizing, sleeping... Alas, no, it wasn't meant to be.

But the show was AMAZING!!! I more than doubled what we made last year at the show. I managed to snap off a couple pictures before the show officially started & we ended up slammed for the day!



Lots of stuff going on with this table! We got Indulgence Creams, Bath Salts, Sugar Scrubs, Facial Products.


This is the first show we've done since introducing the Mineral Lipsticks. We were a little creative with the displays for them. We found these great triple trays that fit them perfectly. Then we stacked white boxes underneath them to create the tiers. I was VERY happy with how they turned out!

We also got those adorable white lip balm boxes for the show! They hold 12 lip balm tubes, and just showed them off so nicely! This display really sold well for us!


We always try to have a few soap logs to cut by the slice. It's such a crowd pleaser, and really draws in the crowds. Although we always get a lot of people asking if it's fudge! I want to get this table better signed next year. It was kind of a last minute load it into the car thing this time! Oops!

That yellow & green log was our new Lemongrass Essential Oil Soap. I hadn't even offered it online yet. It SOLD OUT at the show! I was so amazed! It was an 18 inch log too! So we are planning on making another log this week, then a large batch once our Lemongrass EO arrives later this month.


And everyone wave to my husband, David! That's him hiding out at the back! I LOVE it when he comes to shows with me. It's always hard on his back, so he doesn't come to a lot of them, but he's always been such a better sales person than me (he's so much more outgoing than I am). That and it's always a lot of fun!


The last week of the month wasn't much fun though. I had a root canal the Monday after the show. My mom had hip reconstruction surgery the Wednesday after that (she went home from the hospital today). I was fitted for a crown yesterday (and still ache enough that I'm on a soft food diet). And I get to repeat the root canal/crown appointments next week. Joy.... (a different dentist cracked both my back bottom molars when he removed my wisdom teeth, so all this is fixing what he screwed up)


And in between all that, we're still shipping out tons of orders, and making stuff constantly so that we're ready for the big holiday rush!

So September was crazy. And I'm SOOOO glad it is over!!!

Harvest Market Success (and pictures!)

We had so much fun at the Harvest Market at Sundance on Saturday! Even though I was in pain most of the day and drugged up for all of it, we had a lot of fun (I severely sprained my ankle Thursday night, had a splint on it, and honestly, wasn't supposed to be on it nearly as much as I was!).


We arrived right at eight, and I hobble through FROST to get to my booth space (seriously, my splint was caked with snow by the time I got there), only to find out I was on a hill. Even if I thought I could set up without all my product rolling off my tables, I knew I would never be able to navigate on anything but a level surface. Luckily the coordinator sympathized, and he moved me down to a more level location!

My parents were kind enough to come help me & David with the set up. I could lift things, but not walk. David could walk but not lift things. Yeah, we were a GREAT pair! As we started to unload the van, David panics. He forgot the tent!!! Miraculously, he was able to run home in my parents' truck, grab the tent, and get back down with it before the show started, but it was a lovely little wrench thrown into the plans! But we survived!

While he was getting the tent, my parents helped me set up as much as we could. I went to put the black table cloth down on the 8 foot table, and found out that my cute little WHITE puppy must have somehow found it. It was covered in dog hair! So we were forced to use the green cloth that was provided with the table. It looked okay, but not quite what we were planning!


Although I really like how the burgundy runner looked draped over the table. I think it'll be really stunning on the black cloths for future shows. We did have another one for the other table, but forgot to put it out, and I'm going to blame my forgetfulness on the percocet! (which sadly, is probably accurate)

We also added sheer burgundy tie back panels to each of the front corners (sorry, no pictures!). It really added a nice final touch to the booth and helped tie things together.

Oh, and our other freak out moment during set up...

My mom asks me, "Lindsay, where are the rest of your lip balms?"

Me, "They're in one of the boxes."

Mom, "No they're not."

WHAT?!?!?!?! Guess what, I left two entire boxes of lip balms at home. We had about 7 flavors out of our normal 40 flavor line. Of course we discovered this AFTER David had texted me to let me know he was on his way back, otherwise we would have had him bring those with him as well. So... big change of plans in set up! We originally had one more 4 foot table running along the right wall. Without all those lip balms, I didn't have enough product to fill all 3 tables. But in hindsight, the good thing about pulling the table, it gave me a place to sit and elevate my foot during the day.

(our booth is the one to the left of the big american flag)

Finally it's 10am, our booth is set up, I'm not completely freezing, and the buyers are starting to stroll in. My parents head home and David & I are up and ready to have a great day in sales.

And we really did! I am so glad he came with me. Even if I'd been at 100%, I wouldn't have been able to do it all on my own! We were kept busy busy busy all day long. We handed out at least 150 business cards (I'll need to get more before the next show!), we handed out all our 1/4 oz lotion samples (those were a hit!). We sold out of several soaps and a couple of lotions. We also took some custom orders that we'll be shipping out this week.

Highlights of the day:

• Someone came to the show because she read about it on my blog! That was awesome!

• I met one of my regular Etsy customers! She and her friend walked around the corner of my booth and all of a sudden I hear her shout, "Oh my gosh, come here! This is who I buy all my lip balms from!" As soon as she told me her name, I knew exactly who it was! It was so much fun to meet her in person!!!

• I also had two ladies ask me about wholesaling! They're both unique local business, and they'd be a lot of fun to work with! So here's crossing fingers that that works out!

Finally 4 o'clock rolled around, and my brothers showed up to help us break down. I was actually sad to go! We had sales right up until the very end (and some people looking even when we had almost everything packed up). It was so cool to be hauling EMPTY product boxes back to the van. We brought 8 or 9 bankers boxes filled with product and we went home with 4 empty ones! WooHoo!!!

I'm now utterly exhausted (I slept for 12 hours last night!!!), and I'm forcing myself to take Sunday completely off (more for my ankle than anything else). But I'll be jumping back into the swing of things Monday morning again! (and we'll be adding our soaps back into our shop as we double check our post show inventory since we also have a new wholesale account that we'll be filling as well)

If you'd like to see more pictures of the show, we have some posted on our Flickr.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/blsoaps/sets/72157622467673770/

Harvest Market at Sundance

If you live in Utah, come visit us this Saturday (September 26, 2009) at the Harvest Market at the beautiful Sundance Resort! It runs from 10am - 4pm.

We will have our booth set up there and we'd love for you to come meet us in person (not to mention the opportunity to smell & try before you buy!).

If you mention you read about our show on our blog, we'll give you 10% off your purchase!!!

(discount applies to purchases made at the Harvest Market only)