Transcript Interview with Claire Leighton

Transcription

1 Transcript Interview with Claire Leighton

2 00:00:00 David Cushion: Hi; I m here with Claire Leighton at The Villages in Florida. It s a wonderful, retirement complex and I think the population is about 65,000. Yeah; it s gotten pretty big and Claire has a soap-making business and she sells soap to the retirement community here at The Villages. Claire, do you want to tell us a little bit about you business and how you got started and how you ended up down here in Florida? 00:00:28 Claire Leighton: Well how I got down here in Florida was, I had been buying this product and using the product for about four years and was asked if I wanted to learn how to make the product. So my husband and I took the class and learned how to make it and said if she was interested in selling to let us know. And one day we Dave at Claire's Soap Booth at The Villages got an saying I m selling; are you interested? And here I am. [Laughs] 00:00:56 DC: You better--better take the offer while you re the first one being asked. 00:00:58 CL: That s right. That s right; so here I am selling at the Town Squares and loving it. 00:01:04 Page 2 of 34

3 DC: Loving it huh? I know you re into some other crafts because you just showed me quilts on your rack over there, so--. 00:01:09 CL: Yes; I also do some quilting and do a lot of cross-stitching also. So I try and keep myself very busy with craft stuff. 00:01:20 DC: What was it that intrigued you about making soap? 00:01:24 CL: It was the product because I really liked the product and it was something that I really liked and felt very comfortable with and figured hey; you know why not try it? And we came down and watched the previous owner selling it and people were just buying it you know like crazy. So we said wow; you know that Claire Leighton at Vendor Night wouldn t be a bad thing. There is a demand for it. And since I ve been doing it in August, it has increased. My internet sales have increased and I ve gotten a lot of good compliments in trying to expand on it and not just going into the soaps but also doing creams, novelty soaps, body scrubs, and it s really doing well. 00:02:12 DC: Do you do custom orders as well? 00:02:14 Page 3 of 34

4 CL: Yes; I do. I do custom orders. I do you know if people want to buy wholesale--i also do like for baby showers, I ve done little novelties for baby showers and I m in the process of doing novelties for weddings, for party favors. 00:02:34 DC: Okay; yeah I hadn t thought of soap for--. We were just at a wedding a month ago and when you mentioned the novelties I thought that could be a gift or a wedding party gift or something. I don t know. 00:02:46 CL: Well my daughter is getting married in October and that s what we re going to do. I have little, two or three-tier wedding cakes that I have and I also have like multiple heart-shaped soaps and we re going to put the little hearts on the tables as confetti and I m--i don t know if we re just going to put them out or put them in little bags, because some of the scents that I have smell like food [Laughs]. You know and a lot of people think that they re edible, so I don t want people to pick up a piece and start eating it. [Laughs] 00:03:25 DC: Now as you were telling us before we started recording that you and your husband have a lot of creative ideas. And I think that s one of the nice things with soapmaking is it s not just make soap and go take a shower with it. You can use it--i promote it as being great for gifts that people wouldn t normally get. Soaps make such wonderful gifts! Page 4 of 34

5 00:03:46 CL: And I get a lot of comment like that, too, like people are going to someone s house for a housewarming or whatever and they bring a bar of soap because I package them very neatly in a bag with a color-coordinated ribbon. So the packaging itself also looks good, so they give that as a gift and people are Soaps nicely packaged with matching ribbon. really pleased with it. 00:04:07 DC: No; they are very, very attractive. As a matter of fact, we bought five or six the last time we were down here and I haven t taken them out of the package. I have the package just sitting because they--they actually look quite visually appealing just by themselves. 00:04:22 CL: Right. 00:04:24 DC: Now are you -- you mentioned about some of the reasons why you started it, but are you one who believes in the benefit of making your own soap so that you don t get all of the bad things that come in commercial soap? Is that one of the big advantages or not necessarily? 00:04:37 Page 5 of 34

6 CL: No, not necessarily; I just thought that it was very interesting. It was very fun and I like--i like the feel of the soap. 00:04:46 DC: Okay. 00:04:46 CL: You know it s very moisturizing and I--it doesn t dry your skin out and then the fragrance you know, I just like the product on how it--it s used and the use of it you know on your skin. 00:05:01 DC: From the calls and s I get it seems like, I d like to compare it with your notes, it seems like I get more questions on what s a good moisturizing soap and then maybe secondly, what lathers well? But people want the moisturizer it looks like. 00:05:16 CL: Right; and I have shay butter and mango butter in my soaps, which are two moisturizing agents. 00:05:25 DC: Do you have a certain batch of favorite ingredients or-- Well let me--let s start another way; what s the most popular? I mean you sell soap what four times a week down at the Town Squares; what s your most popular soaps? 00:05:35 Page 6 of 34

7 CL: I have three popular fragrances. One is Amazing Grace which a lot of people refer that to the perfume philosophy. And then I have another fragrance that s very popular; it s called Butt Naked and that is the fragrance and people pick it up because of the name. 00:05:55 DC: Just to see what it s like? [Laughs] 00:05:56 CL: To see what it s like and then they smell and say oh that smells good. You know it s kind of a fruity scent and I ve changed some of the colors so it s--it s a--like a florescent pink, so it s very bright, so it gets people s attention and they really like it. And they buy it because of the name. [Laughs] Customers checking out the soaps. 00:06:14 DC: Well and not only for marketing it you know for your retail sales, but if somebody were to make something like that for a housewarming gift it would probably have a little more pizzazz to it than just a plain old bar of white soap. 00:06:24 CL: Right; right, and the third one is called After Sun. That I do in yellow and orange and that one has a nice clean smell. Page 7 of 34

8 00:06:35 DC: Okay; very good. 00:06:36 CL: Those are the favorites. 00:06:39 DC: Now what--do you use Melt and Pour? 00:06:39 CL: Yes; I do. 00:06:42 DC: Yeah; because I know the previous owner, she said oh my gosh, I could never keep up if I did the cold process or something else. She said I have to make so much soap and Melt and Pour I can do it and have it ready in a short time. 00:06:52 CL: Yes; I use the Melt and Pour. 00:06:56 DC: The reason why I think that s significant, there s like two schools of thought; the diehard cold process people and then the Melt and Pour who--it s an easier process to start I think as a beginner-- 00:07:07 Page 8 of 34

9 CL: Yes; it is. 00:07:08 DC: --but people think well then that s beginning soap. But you-- 00:07:12 CL: No. 00:07:12 DC: --are living proof that you make awesome soaps that you can sell all you can make with Melt and Pour. 00:07:16 CL: Yes; yes. No;it is simpler but I think you can--you re--how do I want to say this? You can make a lot at once. You know when I make soap I don t just make one loaf. I ll do 10 loaves and I ll be out there for four or five hours. You know I m not going to try and do just one. I m going to make a whole batch of it. 00:07:40 DC: So for you, you can make a big quantity. For a home person just making soap they could make one loaf and say fine; for their own use or for gifts or whatever. 00:07:50 CL: Exactly. 00:07:51 Page 9 of 34

10 DC: but I mean you just use multiplication for the quantities. [Laughs] 00:07:55 CL: Right, right, right. 00:07:58 DC: Now how about other additives or do you just experiment--not experiment, but add colors just for your own personal tastes or--or what you think your people might want to purchase or--? 00:08:07 CL: I kind of do the colors on--i get a lot of feedback and I try and listen to what the customers say. Like I had the changed the way that my--the vanilla looked; I had changed that and I had gotten a brown color which Nancy never had a brown color before. So I kind of did that kind of more like to the vanilla colors and I was putting orange in it. And one customer who bought a lot of it said when you stop putting the orange in it I ll buy some more. [Laughs] And I said okay. [Laughs] You know so I kind of listen to what they say. 00:08:45 DC: All right; now that was orange just as the color, not--? 00:08:49 CL: Orange as an insert, as an insert, because I use two different types of Melt and Pour. I use a clear Melt and Pour and a white Melt and Pour. 00:08:58 Page 10 of 34

11 DC: Okay; what s the biggest difficulty in making soap and what problems can you run into? Obviously you-- 00:09:04 CL: You run out of time. [Laughs] 00:09:06 DC: Yeah; obviously you--you have it down pretty pat I m sure, but run out of time? 00:09:11 CL: Run out of time; run out of time. If I have events on the weekend that are big, running out of time can make it--that s my biggest--. 00:09:21 DC: As far as the making of it, once you--once a beginner-- 00:09:23 CL: No. 00:09:24 DC: --catches on and knows how to do it it s a piece of cake, right? 00:09:27 CL: Oh yes; yes. 00:09:27 Page 11 of 34

12 DC: That s what we ve found. 00:09:29 CL: And you--and I, you know tweaked my process to make it simpler and I m still tweaking it. You know I tweak it every day; you find--okay what s the quickest way that I can do this? 00:09:39 DC: Kind of an assembly line process? 00:09:39 CL: Yes; you know I just got to get organized and say okay this is what I ve got to do first and I--I think I ve got it down pat pretty good. 00:09:48 DC: So how long does it take you to make a batch to take out there? 00:09:50 CL: Well last night I made--what is it--eight loaves or nine loaves and it took me four hours. 00:10:02 DC: That s a lot of soap. 00:10:04 CL: Yeah; it took me four hours. I was out there at 6:00 and came back at 10:00. [Laughs] 00:10:09 Page 12 of 34

13 DC: Okay; that--that s good. 00:10:13 CL: And of course I ve got better Melting Pots than what the previous owner used and I find that s really slick. [Laughs] 00:10:22 DC: So yeah; in your situation you re going to use Melting Pots. You re not going to be heating stuff up in a microwave and doing all that right? 00:10:29 CL: No. 00:10:31 DC: Does--does it make the soap any better or does it just-- 00:10:32 CL: No. 00:10:34 DC: --make the quantities, your large quantities easier to make? 00:10:35 CL: It makes it easier to make because my Melting Pots have a spigot and so all I have to do is just open the spigot, pour it in a bowl and--. [Laughs] Page 13 of 34

14 00:10:46 DC: Oh; now are these custom-made for you or can you buy them? 00:10:48 CL: You can buy them on the website. 00:10:50 DC: You can okay; very good. 00:10:52 CL: There s a lot of websites out there. 00:10:53 DC: Any--what would be a good two or three tips that you would give a beginner, somebody who was interested in starting to make their own soap for whatever reasons they ve chose? 00:11:06 CL: I think the toughest part is to decide which fragrance you like. [Laughs] You know really that--that s the--the toughest part, you know is just trying to put what fragrance with what color, what kind of design you want to put in. You know I wish--i m trying to find different molds to be more creative with the inserts but they re not easy to come by because you need more of a silicone or rubber that s very pliable. 00:11:37 DC: Okay; to extract it--easy to extract? Page 14 of 34

15 00:11:39 CL: Yeah; yeah because some of the soap molds that are out there right now are very--the novelties are very hard to take them out. 00:11:47 DC: Well you just made an interesting comment that it s important to combine the color with the fragrance because you could have like a conflicting color fragrance combination to where it just--i m going to say turns you off a little bit. 00:11:59 CL: You could. I try and--if it s a floral scent try and think okay, you know this--this is the color of the flower so I guess I ll make it you know this, or you can just go right off the wall. I guess it all depends on the individual that s making the soap. I--I like to match. And maybe some people will think let s just do something crazy. 00:12:22 DC: So if it s purple it may have a lilac smell but not necessarily? 00:12:24 CL: Right; right. But I like to keep it the same as close to the flower as I can. 00:12:31 DC: Okay. 00:12:33 CL: But you can do--. Page 15 of 34

16 00:12:33 DC: Isn't that one of the beauties of making soap; you can make it however you want? 00:12:41 CL: Exactly. 00:12:45 DC: Andthat I hope that doesn t mean we ve stopped recording. So you know one of the things that we--that I like to tell the people is start with the basic recipes and then tweak them to more or less fragrance or more or less whatever as you go until you find what you like the best. But for a starting point you know give them a bunch of recipes. 00:13:03 CL: Yeah; and I do mine with shay and mango butter. You can go on websites and find other additives; you know you can do goat s milk, you can do you know--. 00:13:15 DC: I get a lot of questions about goat s milk. 00:13:15 CL: I don t know much about goat s-- 00:13:16 DC: I don t either. Page 16 of 34

17 00:13:16 CL: --milk. 00:13:18 DC: Well I mean just from what I ve studied but I m not as into goat s milk as some of these people seem to be. 00:13:24 CL: Yeah; and there s what--olive oil soap, there s you now cocoa butter. 00:13:29 DC: Cocoa butter is another big one. 00:13:29 CL: You know aloe; you know there s different things that you can experiment on. You now I experimented yesterday with one. I found some at a craft store--some seeds, so I made a loaf of soap with some of these seeds in it, so--. Let s try it. 00:13:51 DC: Yeah. Can you overdo ingredients? Can you put too many things in to where they don t intermingle well let s say? 00:13:55 CL: I would say yes. 00:13:57 Page 17 of 34

18 DC: Yeah, probably. 00:13:58 CL: Yes. 00:13:58 DC: Kind of confuse the issue if you get too carried away? 00:14:00 CL: Yeah; then you won't get you know the lathering or you know you don t know how the reaction will be with these--all of these different--. 00:14:08 DC: Yeah; obviously you could experiment with a small batch. 00:14:10 CL: Right; right. 00:14:11 DC: But in general I would think to put eight or ten things in one doesn t make-- 00:14:13 CL: Yeah; no. 00:14:15 DC: --for a better soap? Page 18 of 34

19 00:14:15 CL: Keep it simple. 00:14:16 DC: Keep it simple; all right. 00:14:18 CL: You know people like simple stuff. They don t like a lot of additives in it because then more questions--well I m allergic to this; how will it react? And you know you ll get more into liability issues and--. 00:14:31 DC: Yeah; so if a person is--is beginning their soap-making and they--do you think they re just better off taking a--for starters a basic one or two recipes and try it and see how the process goes and see if they like the soap? 00:14:40 CL: Yeah; yes. 00:14:43 DC: And then they can try some other ones. At least that s what we feel works pretty well. 00:14:45 Page 19 of 34

20 CL: Yeah; yeah, and I also do a plain unscented, uncolored one because I have a lot of demand for that because people are either allergic to the fragrance or colors. They don t want--they got very sensitive skin so I sell just plain soap. 00:15:04 DC: Plain soap? 00:15:04 CL: And love it; and--and-- 00:15:05 DC: But it s got your good ingredients too. 00:15:07 CL: Yes. 00:15:08 DC: You know Nancy told me one time, you know she s got some--i don t know if they were called proprietary places or what but anyway she thought her ingredients were like better quality- -better quality, I don t--. Where do you find let s say better quality ingredients versus say a kind of bottom of the--? 00:15:23 CL: Well if you go buy a soap kit at Michael s or at a craft store I don t think the quality is as good as a supplier that we have. Page 20 of 34

21 00:15:35 DC: A soap supplier? 00:15:36 CL: Yeah; and--and you can usually tell. 00:15:41 DC: No; that s a good point, because I ve had people me well I tried this soap from a lobby- hobby place and you know it didn t really turn out so good. 00:15:51 CL: Right. 00:15:51 DC: Or you know is there a better place to buy and we kind of direct them to some of the resources that we have listed and--. But I did catch from--from the last time that she thought that her soap was so popular because it just had better stuff in it, so it s not--. 00:16:06 CL: Yeah. 00:16:07 DC: Soap isn't necessarily soap I guess is the way she put it. 00:16:10 CL: Right; right. Page 21 of 34

22 00:16:15 DC: So do you have hundreds of recipes or do you just zero in on--being in the business you probably know what your top six or eight or ten sellers are and you kind of concentrate on those? 00:16:26 CL: Yes; I--I have like on my website I have like 45 different fragrances and I kind of stick on those. I found out kind of the hard way; people do not like change. [Laughs] They do not like change, so I couldn t come in and say--and change all of my fragrances--no way. Or, even if I try and add a new one I get a lot of grief. [Laughs] You know they want-- 00:16:54 DC: Because your business is that existing customer, right; yeah? 00:16:57 CL: Right they want what they want. So you know every--almost every night it s--i try and keep--i keep out like to 30 fragrances out but there s always one customer that will come and I don t have what they re looking for. So I said well I can have it for you the following night. [Laughs] 00:17:17 DC: And by the way before I forget to ask you, would you like to tell people the name of your website? Page 22 of 34

23 00:17:20 CL: Oh yes; the name of my website is 00:17:27 DC: Heavenly soaps and more--dot com? 00:17:29 CL: Yeah; dot com. 00:17:31 DC: There was a logo or something that was Sea-something designs or what was that? Is that the old one? 00:17:38 CL: That s--that s Nancy s old one. She was Sea Garden Design. Yeah; she was Sea Garden Design. 00:17:45 DC: Is that just--? 00:17:45 CL: Yes; if people go onto the Sea Garden Design website it brings them to mine because I still have the same guy doing my website as she had, so-- 00:17:57 DC: So he just does a redirect right to your new one? Okay; that s-- Page 23 of 34

24 00:17:59 CL: Yes. 00:17:59 DC: --that s good to know. She s not in the business; we ll send them to you. 00:18:05 CL: Right. 00:18:05 DC: Our goal here with our little chat is to give some--people some tips and things but on the other hand at some point if they just wanted some quick great soap they could go to your website. Now--now do you ship? 00:18:15 CL: Yes; I ship all over the United States and I have repeat customers on the internet also. 00:18:21 DC: Because what I was kind of looking to do here is--of course we re--we re training people ourselves but sometimes you just get in a bind or you don t--or if it s a special event coming up and you want some really good soap you might--if you haven t quite got your system down pat yourself then you go to the experts and then they look you up on your website and say ship me a batch? 00:18:39 Page 24 of 34

25 CL: Right. 00:18:40 DC: Okay; well that s good. 00:18:41 CL: Yes. 00:18:43 DC: A couple more questions; let s see you answered the one that you do ship. Now do you ship continental 48 or do you go beyond--outside that? 00:18:51 CL: Well I did ship a shipment to Puerto Rico. There was a client that Nancy had and they contacted me and I got them now. And they order--they ordered what was it--eight loaves of soap; it was a Caribbean company in Puerto Rico that I ship to. 00:19:14 DC: When you go to experiment with a new recipe, how do you go--do you take a recipe that you kind of like and then put in a totally different ingredient or do you just start from scratch and say I m going to try some of this and some of that and see how it turns out? 00:19:29 CL: Usually I keep the basic ingredients the same and I just play around with the fragrances or the oils, you know do different combinations. Do different combinations, because I also--i did forget--is I do dog soap also,-- Page 25 of 34

26 00:19:46 DC: Oh good one; yeah. 00:19:47 CL: --which has citronella oil and cedar wood oil which are both insect repellants. 00:19:57 DC: So that stays right on the dog for a-certain duration to help-- 00:20:01 CL: Yeah; yeah and I ve had people test it for me and they love it. 00:20:05 DC: Well that s interesting, very--very good. 00:20:07 CL: Yeah. 00:20:09 DC: Yeah; we have two--let s say grand-dogs that just--just moved back home and we have--we baby-sit them a lot, so we ll have to take that message back--back to the kids. Yeah; that--no that s good. Briefly let s talk about a business. If you were to start-- and of course I guess like everybody says, I m not an attorney. I don t think you are so don t take this as legal advice. You know seek your own expertise, but did--are there legal and health issues? I would assume that anybody who has made soap and says hey you know what; I m pretty good at this. I want to start Page 26 of 34

27 selling it at a craft show or go online or whatever, there s I think a few checkpoints that they need to make sure that they--not only set up their business of course, but more concerned about the safety and liability aspect or--or health regulatory stuff. 00:20:58 CL: Well if you get really big and I--it s a fine line, which with the project that we have in mind we re going to have to do a lot more research into it--you ve got to go through the FDA because right now I can--which I contacted the FDA, which I don t need to go through the FDA right now because I m not putting a disclaimer on the product. I m not saying it s going to do this, it s going to do that; I m not saying anything. 00:21:29 DC: If you said my soap cures cancer they want to talk to you? 00:21:30 CL: Right; right, and if you sell a lot out of the country or all over you ve got to go through them. And it s very expensive to go through the FDA to be licensed through them. So they said if I just did it at craft fairs or the way that I m doing it, I do not need to go through FDA, but I cannot say that it s going to really--it s really good for your skin or it s going to take away wrinkles, it s going to do that--no; I can't say that. 00:21:59 DC: So you can't even say it s a moisturizer that will keep your skin from being dry? 00:22:03 Page 27 of 34

28 CL: Well I can--i can say that. 00:22:03 DC: You can do that--something like that? 00:22:05 CL: I can say that but I m not--i don t have a disclaimer that it s guaranteed to do that. 00:22:09 DC: I see. 00:22:09 CL: Because maybe it won't for you. 00:22:12 DC: Yeah; okay. 00:22:12 CL: You know I have no--. So when people do ask me, I said I don t know; you ve got to try it. I have no disclaimer. 00:22:21 DC: Did you have to file papers like with the local Health people or anything like that? 00:22:24 CL: No. Page 28 of 34

29 00:22:24 DC: No? 00:22:24 CL: No; I did not have to do that. The only thing you ve got to do is just get insurance, liability insurance. 00:22:29 DC: Yeah; somebody takes it and says hey I got a rash and then the rash turns into whatever. 00:22:33 CL: Right. 00:22:33 DC: And I was in the hospital two weeks. 00:22:34 CL: Right; that--that s the only thing that a lot of crafters will ask for is that you have liability insurance. 00:22:43 DC: And again, people should do their own-- 00:22:46 CL: Research. Page 29 of 34

30 00:22:46 DC: --due diligence for--for the State-- 00:22:47 CL: Because every-- 00:22:48 DC: --and the locale they live in? 00:22:49 CL: Every State is different. And every craft fair is different. You know some people will ask for liability insurance; some people will not. And usually you have to send a copy of your binder. 00:23:03 DC: Now how about for managing your business; is that--i mean in my case it s a chore because it s all the little grunt work that I hate doing. I d rather do the making and the marketing and--. But you re--you have a past career in accounting; do you do all that? 00:23:19 CL: [Laughs] Yes; I do. I do. I ve got tons of spreadsheets. [Laughs] 00:23:24 DC: So you d be a head--a head start on me. I don t enjoy that at all. 00:23:31 Page 30 of 34

31 CL: I have tons of spreadsheets. You know I have--and I have a checklist that I bring with me every night, a new sheet every night that s kind of tedious but it lists all of the soaps and every time I sell one I ll put a check mark next to it, so I m keeping also a spreadsheet of the most popular so then at the end of the night or at the end of the week I go in and I update which soaps were sold and I tie back to the money that I get, and so at the end of the year I can--or at the end of the month I can realize how many--which ones were the most popular for that month. 00:24:07 DC: Well I m sure that s very helpful information for you to know what to make more of and-- 00:24:10 CL: Yeah. 00:24:12 DC: --what maybe it s not worth--worth your time, even though this one soap might be okay-- 00:24:16 CL: Right. 00:24:16 DC: --I m not selling too many, so I ll make some others that--. Yeah; that s-- 00:24:18 CL: Yeah; and sometimes I do get kind of busy that I can't keep track of everything, so I have a miscellaneous line and that s where it goes. [Laughs] Page 31 of 34

32 00:24:27 DC: Yeah; okay. Well finally, do you have any encouragement or advice for somebody who is looking to make their own soap just for either--for their own enjoyment or with a down-the-road thought of maybe going into business? 00:24:38 CL: I just say have fun and you know enjoy it; you know I really do enjoy doing this. 00:24:45 DC: Great; I ve found the fun is in the journey. It s not necessarily okay; I want to end up with soap. It s kind of fun along the way. 00:24:49 CL: No. 00:24:49 DC: Enjoy it and experiment and try different things and you might have a favorite soap and then try something else and have a new favorite soap. 00:24:56 CL: Exactly, because people will ask me, well what s your favorite on? I can't answer them, you know because there s so many. And what I like may not be what they like. 00:25:08 DC: Absolutely; that s why there s all those flavors of ice-cream, right? Page 32 of 34

33 00:25:09 CL: That s--that s right; you know so I--but it is fun. Have fun. You meet a lot of nice people. You know you do get repeat customers and just enjoy it. That s what I m trying to do. [Laughs] 00:25:23 DC: Well Claire, I d like to thank you very much. 00:25:25 CL: Thank you. 00:25:26 DC: And once again would you give--give the listeners your website? 00:25:28 CL: Yes; my website is Check it out. 00:25:33 DC: Thank you very much. 00:25:35 CL: Thank you. 00:25:36 DC: It s been very enjoyable picking your brain here and learning some new things and seeing how somebody operates in the soap-making business up close. 00:25:42 Page 33 of 34

34 CL: Thank you. 00:25:42 DC: Thank you. 00:25:45 [End Claire Leighton Interview] I hope you enjoyed the interview with Claire and found it helpful. Dave Page 34 of 34