2012年5月2日 星期三

In a Green Building Downtown, a Family is Busy Making Organic Soap

The name of Rochester's new business is Moon River Soap Company, but it could have just as easily been called Serendipity. That's because it was a bit of a happy accident that made this soap such a success.

"When I was working on my recipe, I did all the measurement conversion the old-fashioned way, with my head," owner Liz Aprea said. "A year later I discovered a 'soap calculator' on the internet. It turns out my conversions were off and I was using too much oil, but I liked it so I've kept the recipe as is."

Without the mathematical error, Liz said "We probably would have had a very average bar of soap."

Instead, they have a thriving family business that outgrew its original New Baltimore location and moved to Rochester for more space to produce, dry and sell their popular hand-poured olive oil soap. They opened their new doors last week.

"The thing about Rochester is that people here are mostly using organic already, so I only have to explain what makes us different," Liz said.

"I got into organic soaps when I turned 40," Liz said. "We had already gone to organic food but I had not realized all the toxic chemicals in regular soap and how our skin absorbs that into the body. It was counterproductive to eat organic then put chemicals on your skin."

The improvement in her skin was dramatic, Liz said. But it took the arrival of her first grandchild, Jackson, to turn her from a consumer into a producer.

"We were using a trusted baby product on him and it just tore his skin up," Liz said.

Liz decided it was time to stop just buying organic soap and start making her own.

Daughter Sandra explained, "Some natural soaps use plant oil but then add synthetic fragrance — that's the worst, some is similar to rocket fuel!"

Liz began researching organic soap and tinkering with her recipe. Moon River soaps are made with omega-rich olive oil, botanicals and pure essential oils. Rosemary extract and natural vitamin E are the only preservatives. There is no petroleum or artificial or synthetic materials.

With her recipe in place, Liz and her husband Carlos started making and selling soap out of their home using a 15-pound mold.Kitchen floortiles at Great Prices from Topps Tiles. The name Moon River came from the Johnny Mercer song, which Liz loves.

When they couldn't produce enough product to keep the shelves stocked,Proxense's advanced handsfreeaccess technology. they moved into a larger location in New Baltimore in May of 2009 and started using 30-pound molds.

But in less than three years they needed more space and downtown Rochester benefited from their move.

"We are up to 54-pound molds now, the largest by-hand mold. It makes 165 full-sized bars and we make one batch daily," Liz said.

With the larger operation, there has been a distinct division of labor in the family. "This is something we can all do," Liz said.

Husband Carlos is the sole soap maker. He can be seen daily at 10 a.m. making the soap.

"People were always asking to see the soap being made at our old location so when we found this space with the windowed area, it was perfect," Liz said.

Liz now focuses on lotions and balms. Sandra does all the graphic design. And daughter Anna works on bath fizzies,A wireless indoortracking system is described in this paper. bath balms and soap wrappers — although lately she's been on maternity leave working on a sibling for Jackson.

"When we first opened we were just a building with bars of soaps," Sandra said. Now they offer a full line of skin products, including a Moon Baby line that launched last year.

"I listen to what my customers want and I have a long list of things to make," Liz said with a laugh.

"It can be used on dry skin, cuticles, diaper rash and under the eyes for wrinkles. It's very healing," Liz said.

For personal favorites, Liz named the Grapefruit Dead Sea Salts. "I'm a bath girl and I can't live without them!"

Sandra called out the Moon Dog shampoo bar. A super gentle bar soap for dogs — yes, dogs — Sandra uses it on her own hair and said it makes her curly, coarse hair so soft, like no other product has been able to do. "I've never used a better shampoo," she said.

And as for Carlos, the soap guy and incurable romantic after 30 years of marriage: "Other than Liz, what I love best in this store is the soap. It really benefits people."

He can't name a specific soap because he uses them all,I found them to have sharp edges where the injectionmoldes came together while production. claiming all the "ugly" pieces left over after cutting, but said the Mr.Learn all about solarpanel. Wonderful bar was named after him.

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