I had a great experience last night! Lori, my daughter's MIL, has been
making/selling her own line of organic, all natural soaps, creams and body butters
for a little over a year. She came up with an idea for a home party that I
think is unique, and I was part of her test group in her home last night. 10 of
us gathered for an evening of lotion making!
First, Lori passed around a basket full of various sample body creams for us to
sniff. There must have been 40 of them, and they ranged from sweetly youthful
(Strawberry Lemonade) to masculine (Shave & a Haircut), to more subdued and
herbal (Lemongrass). We drank wine, sniffed, compared, sorted out, and finally
each chose the scent they wanted to use for their cream. We were making 16 oz.
each, so the next step was to choose the size bottles we wanted: two 8 oz.; one
8 oz. plus two 4 oz; or four 4 oz. There was even talk of partnering up and
exchanging bottles when we were finished so we would go home with a variety.
We adjourned to the kitchen, and prepped our individual work stations.
Each of us had a measuring cup, an little electric whisk, and a plastic
pipette. Lori gave each of us the bottle of essential oil that corresponded to
the scent we had chosen. We sterilized our whisks with alcohol while we watched
Lori begin to make a big pot of body cream base. All of the ingredients, including
almond oil, shea butter and jojoba oil were pre-measured, so the assembly went
quickly. As she worked, Lori explained how she became interested in this, and
how she went through tons of research and trial & error to develop the
recipes she thought worked best. She only uses top of the line, natural
ingredients, and the results show the care she takes. Once the base was
done (it looked like a a slightly thickened milk), she poured 16 oz. of it into
each of our cups. We used the pipette to measure the essential oil, then add it
to our cream. The resulting concoction was whisked for about a minute, and
poured into our bottles. Lori explained that we needed to take the tops off our
bottles when we got home & let the cream thicken overnight.
But what is a bottle of wonderful body cream without a label? Lori provided
materials for us to use to create our own labels; some of us came up with exotic
names, and some of us just stuck with the basics. OK, mine was a mix of
coconut and bitter orange, which I named Coq Orange). She had ingredient labels
for the back (or the bottom) of the bottle, so we knew just what was in there.
We got to pick fabric bags and ribbon trim to carry our creations home.
It was a lovely evening! We gave Lori some suggestions on how to make the
process work even better than it did, and went home with bottles of high-quality body cream to use ourselves or to give as gifts. She plans on rolling this out as a
home party very soon. The cost for each person would be $25, with the hostess
being free. During the course of the night, Lori draws names out of a basket
for door prizes, and she also brings quantities of her other products for sale.
As an aside, once I started using her soaps, I won't use anything else.
If you are interested in a MYOBC party, let me know. It really was a lot of fun. Lori is near Willow
Grove. PA. The optimal group size (depending on how much room you have) is probably around 10. The length of the party depends upon the number of participants; ours took a little over 2 hours. Her company is
Ethereial Soap Company.
If
you want to see some her products, they are in a store in Hatboro called
Naturalistic. Here are a few.
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