Soap Makers Help!

Morgaine what do you sell on average when you work the market? I'm trying to figure out what to expect. There are no other soapers working FM here so there won't be any selling pressure.
 
Morgaine what do you sell on average when you work the market? I'm trying to figure out what to expect. There are no other soapers working FM here so there won't be any selling pressure.

I sold 7 sample packs for $10 each and and a little over 50 bars ( I can't remember the exact number of bars I went with and I forgot to write it down that time) and I made a little < $10 with the samples. I did trade one bar for some tomatoes with another vendor. The week before I sold around 22 bars.

I did a mothers day special of 3 for $12 instead of 5 for $20.

This was a really big market day(that I've seen so far), there were quite a few more vendors and the foot traffic was bigger too. I also had a two repeat customers
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How big is your market and how much traffic does it get? How many hours is it?​
 
I need to get making soap!! I'm in a bit of an excited panic at the moment - and of course no one but the dogs are here to share it with (dh is out of cell range lol).
I've been asked to join the Saturday Farmer's Market in a nearby town!! I can't believe it, they emailed me! I'm not sure how she got my email address or the pictures I sent to friends/family last night but she says she saw the pictures and thinks they will do extremely (her word) well. They did have someone last year who did really well with soaps but they had personal issues so cannot sign up again this year. I called and spoke to her and told her I won't be ready till the end of June as I won't have enough soap ready till then. She said not to worry about it, they will hold a space for me and deduct the cost for those missed weeks off my season fees - the full season is $250. That includes the table and for $5 a week they will set up a canopy over the table for me and I pay the guy when I show up on the Saturday for that. They take care of all the putting up and take down, I just need to show up with product to sell. She's going to email me with the amount I'll owe and she said to just send in the paperwork with a post dated cheque. I'll do better than that though and go over next week with the paperwork and pay cash. She also recommended I sign up with a flea market in our area that runs on Thursdays and Sundays. So I will give them a call and check it out.

I'm excited and scared all at the same time..lol. The lady said I don't need to be a registered business, but I'm thinking it may be a good idea. We already have a name picked out, just have to verify it's not in use and register it.
 
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I sold 7 sample packs for $10 each and and a little over 50 bars ( I can't remember the exact number of bars I went with and I forgot to write it down that time) and I made a little < $10 with the samples. I did trade one bar for some tomatoes with another vendor. The week before I sold around 22 bars.

I did a mothers day special of 3 for $12 instead of 5 for $20.

This was a really big market day(that I've seen so far), there were quite a few more vendors and the foot traffic was bigger too. I also had a two repeat customers
smile.png


How big is your market and how much traffic does it get? How many hours is it?

It's a decent size. We have big old court house there that was the county seat at one time. And it was in the shooting of a movie last year I think. Johnny Dep (sp?) was there. Anyway fromwhat I hear they have a lot of traffic go through. At this point I think I have 90 some bars ready to go. What do you think?

Breconbcs comgrats! I'm still nervous about the FM lol. I had to register mine there was no way around it. What name did you come up with? You'll do great.. Out here they charged a $150 for the season. It runs for 19 weeks. We do all the setup and breaking down. And it has to be done fast at the end of the day becasue then they open the main road back up.
 
Just wanted to post a pic of the Herbal Mint soap that I made:

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The color didn't come out quite true to life in the photo, probably because it was sunny and backlit when I took the picture, but you get the idea. It's actually a darker green than shows up here.

I colored it with an OO infusion of comfrey and rosemary, scented it with a mint EO, and added dried mint and some parsley powder at trace.

I don't know about the scent though. I'm actually hoping it dies down some. I soaped it at .5 oz./pp as was recommended at the Soap Queen site, but it seems a bit strong to me.
 
When I have used peppermint or spearmint in a soap batch, the frangrance has a tendancy to mellow.
Water keeps the frangrance more pure while goat's milk looses more of the edge.
Good looking soap!!!
 
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I think it looks great. Some of my soaps were like that with the scent but they got better after a while.


Now for a small rant
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My MIL is irritating as heck. She is putting together a gift basket for a wedding reception. It is a small ceramic basket (not very pretty) and she has picked out about 7 soaps to put in it. And she wants to put a loofa or washcloth in it. It is NOT big enough to hold all the soaps and have them arranged nicely much less adding a washcloth or something. Ok back to the point. She only wants one of the soaps to have the business name on the BACK of the bar and all the rest are to have plain labels with only the ingredients and maybe the name of the soap. The people they are going to are people that shop the expensive stores, not the smaller stores. Anyway I tried to tell her I didn't want to do it that way and she said to just give her the ingredients list and she would go make the labels
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So I told her I would just do it. But I really don't feel right about it. So I just sent her an email explaining things from my point of view and said she could even just leave the labels off the soaps entirely and just wrap the whole freaking basket in celaphane or gift wrap. Am I wrong about this? Maybe I shouldn't feel this way
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DH said next time she does that I could just tell her to take her business some where else. He doesn't understand why she wants them labeled that way. Please tell me how you would feel and or deal with this
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