Goat Milk Soap A "Natural" Business

Goat Milk Soap A "Natural" Business 27-3-6 For the past three years, Eileen Whitten has been tapping into a specialty market to boost income from her goat herd. The young Fort Assiniboine, Alberta, farm woman decided to start making and selling hand-crafted, all natural goat milk soap. She says customers love it because of its rich, moisturizing, soothing properties. She calls her operation, "Nanny Acres." Whitten raises registered Alpine and Saanen goats. She did some research on the internet to find soap recipes and started experimenting. "None of those recipies worked to my satisfaction, so I developed my own just by trial and error. I have my own little trade secrets for overcoming a few problems that can arise when making soap, like how to prevent soda ash from forming during the curing process and how to keep the soap bars from souring without refrigeration," she says. "Some people have trouble with their milk curdling during the process, but I never have. I'm very confident in my techniques and my finished product is very professional looking." This professional look is made possible by custom-made plastic soap molds which put her logo on every bar. Whitten says milk soaps in general, create a rich and creamy lather and are soothing to sensitive or irritated skin. They help skin conditions such as psoriasis and eczema and help balance skin oils. Whitten uses about two liters of raw goat milk to make 50-bar batches in her basement "soap room." She measures and weighs all her ingredients using a digital scale and, during the process, she ensures the proper temperature is reached, using a digital thermometer. Whitten produces nineteen different scent-varieties of soap, seven of which use all natural essential oils for their fragrances. She also makes a "Cowboy/Cowgirl scrub" which is essentially just one of the 19 soaps with a piece of loofah embedded in it for scrubbing power. One soap she produces is an all-natural pet bar called "Shoo Bug Shoo." The oil blend she uses is a natural insect repellent. In addition to the milk, Whitten includes palm oil, coconut oil and olive oil. She also adds emollients such as emu oil, castor oil and shea butter. She uses natural coloring from things such as carrot juice. The Nanny Acres All Natural Goat Milk Soaps cost $5 per bar or three bars for $12 (Canadian). Bar size is about 3.5 oz.. There's a $5 shipping and handling fee for mail orders. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Eileen Whitten, Nanny Acres, Box 176, Fort Assiniboine, Alberta, Canada, T0G 1A0 (ph 780 584-2210), email: nannyacres@telus.net).

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