A woman informed me I need to have more sales and many of my fellow handmade soapmakers are having sales over the 4th of July and had them during Memorial Day and I NEEDED to match their discounts. My answer is No Sales!
Holidays for me are exactly that – holi days. They are a time for remembering our faith, family and country. The 4th of July should not be cheapen to shopping sales and home repair deals. While I don’t think we need to sit somberly around on the long weekend, we do need to look more at what others have done for us in the past and now. It’s a little virtue called HUMILITY. It’s amazing to me how I am told I don’t care about soldiers if I don’t put a ribbon on my car, but in the next breath told there’s an amazing Memorial Day sale at the local mass market shoe warehouse with discounted shoes made in Asia where labor is cheap. Are all of us flying flags at our house on this day? You should be. Whether you like the direction our country is going or not, this Memorial Day and the 4th of July are about the individuals that have committed themselves to sacrifice and duty not some party or group.
So no Mrs. Disgruntle Shopper, I have no special sales for you this weekend. Please shop else where. And save yourself some time too come December as you will never see Pre or After Christmas Sales either here at MoSoap or any of my businesses. Christmas for me is a holy time and extends 12 days after December 25th too. As a retailer it’s odd to say, but I don’t base my whole year income on pimping my products for Christmas. If I can’t sell enough during the year, I shouldn’t be in business. Also, you won’t find MoSoap open for business on Sundays. When I say we specialize in old fashioned goodness – I really try my best to hold that thought and walk the walk.
I was given a nice surprise today! Jackie over at jackieretroboutique suggested our Garage Soap as one of her picks for a Treasury on Etsy.com. She selected a great variety of handmade items from artisians all across the USA. It will make shopping for that hard to find man easy.
If you aren’t familiar with Etsy.com, take a look. It’s a shopping site filled with handmade artisan goods from around the world – everything from hand knit sweaters to vintage home decor by some of the most talents folks around. Jackie, who suggested us offers vintage clothing up in Canada along with other fun items. And this clever lady has another Etsy shop just for her original design hand knits called Original Knitwear
MoSoap is slowly crawling out of the 1940′s it feels at times and is now on one of the most popular social media site around – Facebook. For those of you that use Facebook and want to keep up with MoSoap, write a comment or ask a question, feel free to join our fan page. You’ll find us at http://www.facebook.com/pages/MoSoap/105229786176947
There’s a special coupon code for MoSoap fans and I’ll have special sales and give-aways over there. It’s easier to use Facebook and the blog to communicate with everyone than sending newsletters. Most of the time people say our newsletters end up in the junk mailbox or they don’t receive them at all!
I had a page up for the last year on Facebook, and we had quite a few fans but when I took some time off and had someone else run the business…well there were a few problems and one of the things that went wrong was all the business pages on Facebook were deleted. Besides MoSoap, you’ll find my other stores with fan pages too. All new and with about 2 friends! So if you were a fan prior, you’ll need to do if again to find us.
It’s been a crazy few weeks with orders – thank you very much – so I can’t complain. We ran out of Gentlemen’s Pine Tar soap and it’s now available once again.
The Gentlemen’s Pine Tar Soap was my grandfather’s favorite blend. It’s Cedarwood essential oils sourced right here from the USA along with a touch of Mexican Lime essential oil. It creates are really nice outdoorsy scent that isn’t too heavy. As one customer put it,” it’s like a freshly cleaned barn in a good way”. Now I can’t ask for anything better than that being a country gal myself…too old to say girl!
I also added some new information around the percentages of pine tar in our soaps. The highest percentages around 25-29% are the Black Pine Tar, Swedish and Shampoo Bar. The others all run around 15% pine tar.
It seems like I was gone all summer or actually since spring I don’t feel like I have work at MoSoap. I am very grateful for all of you that have hung in there with me while I deal with my family. First it was my grandfather’s house in North Carolina, then I had to go to Spokane Washington where my in-laws are at, then helped my Mom through some things when she came to Missouri and last but not least, packed my bags and went home to Florida to see family I hadn’t seen in 30 years. It’s been a quest and I really appreciate everyone’s kind words of encourgement.
My favorite words of advice was from a repeat customer in Kansas City “the Lord steps in and lends a hand! He’s good at doing that if we ask!” I just had to remember to keep asking…and you know what that really helped. Thank you Don for the reminder and not to become overwhelmed with family drama.
So, I’m finishing up the outstanding orders this week and filling the new ones. I am out of Black Drawing Liniment until I have the order of tins arrive, and the milk soap is being made yet again to try to keep in stock.
Doesn’t time go by fast? I figured I had better write something, so here’s the update and what’s been going on at MoSoap.
I just came back yet again from North Carolina where we finally sold my grandmother’s house. There were so many problems with the sale, my mother asked me to come with her as the buyer was working on the house without her approval….excuse me?? Let’s say I wouldn’t recommend Tarheel Realty and am forever grateful to Mr. John Massey, the attorney my mom hired to help us through the closing. Mr. Massey is a true Southern gentleman and fantastic real estate lawyer. I was a legal secretary long ago so I know lawyers and he had my mother’s back.
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The shop was hit with a summer storm damage while I was gone. The appraiser comes out hopefully tomorrow or Friday to check out the roof and ceilings. Our garage doors were actually pushed in 6 inches from the wind and I can’t open them…so I’m luckily the postal service picks up from the shop so I don’t have to drive.
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I’m catching up on orders so most everything will go out this afternoon! Some of you might have seen where the store would be closed from July 3rd to the 10th. Since I went to go to North Carolina earlier at the last moment, I figured I better cancel my trip to Denver. Today, July 6th I was suppose to be in Denver were I was to be sworn in to the Daughters of the American Revolution…but MoSoap comes first. I’m actually a member of the Smokey Hills Chapter in Colorado and not Missouri.
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This week I hope to have some new soaps up. The first one will be the Oatmeal and Honey Soap that people have been asking forever …. it’s funny but I was inspired by honey bees swarming our trees last month and figured it was a sign to make some! I’ll post pictures later this week.
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Also I am in the process of finalizing our new parent store MoHerbs. All of the products and brands I work under will be listed there. I don’t have MoSoap products there yet, but they are on their way. For those of you that have asked about the little buttons and pocket mirrors you find in your orders at times, that’s me too – I make them all myself with flowers from the woods and that business is called The Round Workshop.
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Well I think that’s about all the news for the moment – as always thank you all so much for your patience while I take care of family. I’m trying to be faster at shipping.
Thanks again!!! Happy Summer
Posted in Updates
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Tagged family, news
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I need to close the store until May 1st or so in order to catch up with orders and making soap. For the last 3 months MoSoap has been busier than ever – in fact this April has surpassed Christmas. I’m out of soap!! There’s soap drying but it needs another week before I can release it to sell as it take 4 weeks to cure.
There’s been friends and family helping me the last few months but sometimes that has made things a bit worst. You know the saying “too many cooks in the kitchen”? Well when I was gone, other people wanted to do things they way they thought things should be run….needless to stay some of you ended up with other people’s orders plus yours, phone calls were not returned and some boxes just flat out disappeared. I had to replace over 15 orders and some orders weren’t small either!
So by taking a few days off, I can organize the paperwork so the state of Missouri is happy, organize the shop and figure out how much soap to make and order supplies. If you are looking for your order – all the orders as of 4/27 will ship by Tuesday (tomorrow) unless you paid by check and I am wanting for it to clear.
Thanks for your patience!
debra
I decided to move our blog over to mosoap.wordpress.com ! There’s more features and it will be easier for you to comment and leave suggestions for me. I also have someone redesigning it to make MoSoap look more like I want it to – that’s a challenge for anyone.
So stop back and check us out later in April for our new look.
Thanks,
debra
Posted in Events
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Tagged Events
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Our most popular soaps are by far the white lye and pine tar soaps that are unscented, so the choice was pretty easy. But what should I call the new soap? I’m not terribly clever with fancy soap names like some soapmakers. What’s in the soap is the name usually. Well this 
