Anne-Marie Faiola, Author at Soap Queen

Seth Godin on Public Speaking

November 14, 2007 Filed Under: Business Musings

I’ve been too busy to read much of anything recently (note to Bellingham book club members – I’m on page 22 and not making headway very fast!). Today, at my 4:30 p.m. lunch break (that’s one way to lose weight – forget to eat all day), I sat down and read Seth Godin’s blog. It was worth the break. Excerpted below is my favorite post. If you head to his blog, be sure to read his insights about Dell’s faux permission marketing and the Better Business Bureau’s spam calls.

Copied from Seth Godin’s Blog:

I was at a gala a few weeks ago (featuring no less than ten speakers). At least 80% of them began their talk by saying, “I know you’re hungry, but…” or “I know it’s late, but…” or “I know you want to go home, but…” and then apologized for giving a speech.

If your speech needs to be prefaced by an apology…

don’t give it.

Felt Cupcakes

November 14, 2007 Filed Under: Personal Ramblings

Thank you CakeSpy for featuring these super crafty felt cupcakes. I should order myself a set or two since the real things aren’t doing me any favors lately.

Just today, Michelle commented:

“I’ve gained a few pounds and I’m going to blame your blog.”

Truth be told, I’ve gained a few pounds and I’m definitely blaming my blog! Yesterday, I met with Jody (founder of Cupcake Royale) and she graciously let me sample her Cupcake Harvest cupcakes. I proceeded to eat three partial cupcakes, all in the name of research (of course!). The Carmel Apple was definitely my favorite of the bunch. However, being filled with sugar and fat, all of the cupcakes were delicious. And, again, being filled with sugar and fat, all of the cupcakes are hip expanding, thigh enhancing, stomach softening little morsels of sin.

(grumble grumble) So, it’s off to the gym for me and back to eggs salad and fruit for the rest of the week.

Yoga Poses Sequence Builder

November 14, 2007 Filed Under: Personal Ramblings

I’m starting to get obsessed with yoga (which probably defeats the purpose). Here’s a nifty build-your-own-yoga practice software at YogaJournal so you can have a practice at home (without the drive to the yoga studio or the studio pricing).

Click here to design your own yoga sequence.

Soapy Love Love

November 13, 2007 Filed Under: Personal Ramblings

Just posting beautiful photos of Soapy Love’s work from the last goody box we traded. I hope it’s inspirational! If you haven’t read her Soap Queen interview, click here to read it and learn more about this talented soap artist.

Apple Pecan Fall Soap

November 13, 2007 Filed Under: Personal Ramblings

Thank you to Jeannie in Georgia for sharing her latest fall creation – Grandma’s Apple Pie Soap.

Jeannie says this about her fall soap creations:

“The apple and pecan fragrances are from the Bramble Berry surplus page….They smell divine!”

All of our Surplus Fragrances and products are one-time deals; normally, they’re overruns from major bath and body companies or products that we saw for a close-out price that we pick up for cost-effective alternatives. Get ’em while they’re here because they won’t necessarily stay around for long.

Gel stage

November 12, 2007 Filed Under: Personal Ramblings

Gel stage
Originally uploaded by midohana

More of the same soap artist from the photo below. It’s an excellent example of gel phase and deep soap texture.

Assorted Cold Process Soaps

November 12, 2007 Filed Under: Personal Ramblings

Assorted Cold Process Soaps
Originally uploaded by midohana

I found this photo on Flickr tonight and immediately went weak in the knees at the luscious deep texture on the cold process soap. The soap artist went through a great deal of patient work to achieve the peaks and valleys in the tops of their soap. Beautiful, aren’t they?

Writing a business plan, step two

November 12, 2007 Filed Under: Business Musings

Continuing the “How to Write a Business Plan” series (so you can get loans from a bank, pitch to venture capital or appease your spouse when they ask why you’re putting the house on the line), here is Step Two for your foray into a legitimate business. Click here for the original post on first baby steps for writing a business plan.

After you’ve written your expanded elevator pitch, it’s time to do a traditional SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) analysis. Click here to get a SWOT template.

First, determine your market. Who will buy your product? How many people will buy it? How bigs in the market? Is the market growing? Do you want to be a small fish in a very big pond, or a very large shark in a small pond (pond = market)?

Next, lay out your Strengths. What are you good at? What makes YOU uniquely qualified to deliver XYZ service or good? What will your “secret weapon” be? What are you really good at?

Weaknesses. What do you hate to do? What are you terrified of? Do you have enough money to do the start up? Is your technology up to par? What skills are you missing to make your business successful?

Opportunities. Is the market growing? Are there new markets you could get into with your existing product? Is the demand there for flanker products?

Threats. Who are your competition? What are they selling? How far ahead of them are you? How much money do they have? How well is the market identified? How are your competition viewed in the industry?

This analysis could be analyzed as a free-form essay over many pages or just summarized in a nice grid that looks like the example on the above right.

In my experience, it’s best not to sugar coat your weaknesses or underestimate the strength of your competitors. You’ll only end up disappointing yourself later on when the business isn’t doing as well as you had hoped or promised.

Good Morning Mocha

November 12, 2007 Filed Under: Personal Ramblings

Start out your week right with a dash of Mocha soap from Wylde Ivy. Click here to view details. Or just luxuriate in the crisp clean photo of their delightfully designed soap bars.

Each bar is 3.5 to 4.5 ounces.

This handmade soap contains: Saponified Olive Oil, Palm Oil, Palm Kernal Oil, Coconut Oil, Shea Butter; Coconut Milk, Fragrance Oils, Cocoa Powder, and Colorant

Open Sundae’s Truffle

November 11, 2007 Filed Under: Business Musings

I had a lucky twenty minute break to enjoy an Open Sundae’s Bon Bon this weekend. The Bon Bons are shaped like a densely caloric sugar morsel and smells delightful.

This is the photo from the Open Sundae’s site. They look amazing, colorful and delicious in their native habitat (the official Open Sundae’s site). Regular readers of The Soap Queen will recall that I’m a fan of Open Sundaes (click here to see the visit to their online store).In real life, the Bon Bons um, are not quite as beautiful as the photo above. My inadequate camera and terrible lighting in the bathroom don’t help. While adorable in theory, the Bath Bon Bons don’t pop quite as brightly as photographed on the Open Sundae’s site.

The ingredients for the Bon Bon are: baking soda, citric acid, cocoa butter, shea butter, mango oil, almond oil, grapeseed oil, fragrance, color, sugar

The video below is an example of what the truffle does in the tub. Sadly, it’s a typical bath fizzy with very little residual moisture. Then again, the tub is large. The bath bon bon is small. Lesson learned? A higher oil-to-powder ratio is necessary to actually provide moisture.

The Bath Bon Bon still makes a unique and cute gift. I probably won’t buy one for myself again knowing what I know now (typical bath fizzy with very little moisturizing ability). Even with the small bathing disappointment, I have high hopes for their Soak’n’Melts and Cereal Bombs.

List of Winners for ADGA Show

November 10, 2007 Filed Under: Personal Ramblings

Homemade Essentials or Herbal

1. Earth Scents Herbal Soap :: Susan Calahan

2. Fiore di Capra Lavender Lemon :: Alethea Swift

3. The Delicate Doe Stabar :: Karen Catapano

Homemade Fragrances

1. TLC Fragrance Soap :: Caroline Lawson

2. Little Mama Products :: Sue Harris

3. Far Above Rubies Lilac :: Jennifer Ansley

Homemade Unscented

1. Fiore di Capra Unscented :: Alethea Swift

2. Far Above Rubies Unscented :: Jennifer Ansley

3. Huffaker Farms Unscented :: Jan Huffaker

Homemade Liquid Soap Herbal

1. Double Delight Barley Lemon :: Kathryn Duncan

Homemade Liquid Soap Fragrance

1. Double Delight Ginger Peach :: Kathryn Duncan

Homemade Liquid Soap Unscented

1. Double Delight Unscented :: Kathryn Duncan

Homemade Lotion Essentials or Herbal

1. Fiore di Capra Lavender Lemon Lotion :: Alethea Swift

2. Double Blessing Farm Lotion :: Kathryn Marshall

3. TLC Farms Herbal Lotion :: Caroline Lawson

Homemade Lotion Fragrances

1. Earth Scents Fragrance Lotion :: Susan Calahan

2. B&D Lotion :: Diane Emmich

3. Far Above Rubies Vanilla Almond Skin Cream :: Jennifer Ansley

Homemade Lotion Unscented

1. Far Above Rubies Fragrance Free Skin Cream :: Jennifer Ansley

Gift Packages – Handmade

1.Bean Acres :: Cynthia Bean

2. Saabian Farms :: Karen Butler

3.TLC Farms :: Caroline Lawson

Commercially Manufactured Fragrance Soap

1. White Gate Soaps :: Anne M. Mariani

2. Canus Original :: Canus Vermont, LLC

3. Canus Orchid :: Canus Vermont, LLC

Commercially Manufactured Unscented Soap

1. Canus Fragrance Free :: Canus Vermont, LLC

Commercially Manufactured Liquid Hand Soap

1. Canus Original Fragrance Liquid Soap

Commercially Manufactured Fragrance Lotion

1. Canus Original Fragrance Body Butter :: Canus Vermont, LLC

2. Canus Orchid Moisturizing Lotion :: Canus Vermont, LLC

3. Canus Marigold Oil Moisturizing Lotion :: Canus Vermont, LLC

Commercially Manufactured Unscented Lotion

1. Canus Fragrance Free Lotion :: Canus Vermont, LLC

Commercially Manufactured Body Wash

1. Canus Original Fragrance Body Wash :: Canus Vermont, LLC

BEST IN SHOW – HOMEMADE

TLC Farms Fragrance Soap :: Caroline Lawson

RESERVE BEST IN SHOW – HOMEMADE

Earth Scents Herbal Soap :: Susan Calahan

BEST IN SHOW – COMMERCIALLY MANUFACTURED

White Gate Soaps :: Anne M. Mariani

RESERVE BEST IN SHOW – COMMERCIALLY MANUFACTURED

Canus Original Fragrance Body Butter :: Canus Vermont, LLC

Scraping Wax

November 9, 2007 Filed Under: Home Crafts

As promised two weeks ago, here are two short videos of the long (thirty minutes plus!) scraping process to get the beeswax spill off our kitchen table. The hand in the video belongs to my father.

Nice round up on Shea Butter

November 9, 2007 Filed Under: Personal Ramblings

The Manor Hall Soap Blog has an informative article on why Shea Butter is great in bodycare products. Read it here. The Manor has unrefined shea butter for $8.35 for 2 oz. Bramble Berry’s refined shea butter can be found here for 16 oz. for $6.90.

I am glad that I came across Susan’s blog because it introduced me to her company – the Manor Hall Soap Company.

Manor Hall has gorgeous clean soap photos on their site as well. Susan has a wonderful marketing sensibility with a fun contest where customers take photographs of Manor Hall soap around the world. The soap has been all over! Click here to see all the photos. My favorite is definitely the New York bar.

Every order gets something free and Manor Hall interacts with their customers with a What’s New and a What’s Happening page, updated frequently. This is one company that is taking advantage of all the mediums that the internet has to offer for building a loyal community of customers.

Scraping Wax

November 9, 2007 Filed Under: Tips & Tricks

As promised two weeks ago, here are two short videos of the long (thirty minutes plus!) scraping process to get the beeswax spill off our kitchen table. The hand in the video belongs to my father.