Teach Soap

Had my last show of the spring season yesterday. A friend went along to help. It was a pretty slow day, which I expected, but I did the show because it was a fundraiser for a good cause. When my friend went wandering to browse, she found that a booth in an area behind us was also selling soap along with a bunch of other things, but you couldn't tell from looking at the booth. My friend said, "Oh, you guys have soap too, I'm selling soap in the booth up the hill." She mentioned it thinking that other soapers enjoy meeting each other, but the booth owner angrily said to her "Well that soap is different from ours, it's not natural like ours is." then proceeded to ask her a bunch of questions about how the soap is made and I don't even know what else in a very nasty tone. My friend was shocked and just told the lady she didn't know the answers as she didn't make it and she really just came along to help me and doesn't know much about soap making.

I felt like they were badmouthing me and my product, which as far as I know they never even came to look at before making nasty comments about it. I was so ticked off about it. I don't understand why so many people in the soaping community are so nasty to others.

I am very happy to report that after that, I had a customer who frequently uses handcrafted soap looking at my stuff, then she shopped around and I saw her at the other soap booth. I thought "Great, they're probably going to bad mouth me to customers.", but then the customer came back to my booth and bought from me.

I think it's a insecurity issue. If you know you have a good, quality product, why bad mouth another vendor that sells similar products? Either that, or they must be jealous that another soaper might take business away from them. Just carry on my dear and ignore the bad apples!

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.

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Linda
I know the voices in my head aren't real, but they sure have some great ideas!

Some people are just nasty like that! People like those doesn't deserve any replies for as long as you know that you're doing great with your business.

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~Pamper yourself.

Fellow business people and even some consumers are sometimes willingly to badmouth what isn't theirs or what is out of their comfort zone. Don't take it personally. Some people are just really defensive about their product when they aren't the monopoly.

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The Black Currant- Shipping within the US!

My shop: The Black Currant on Etsy!
My blog: http://www.theblackcurrantshop.wordpress.com
Also on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter & YouTube!

Don't mind them. Just do what you love to do, and don't let anyone stop you from doing it.

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'To whoever says that cleanliness is next to godliness, did a group of angels came down from the sky upon finishing taking a bath?'

Agree with all of you. It can be frustrating though. I try to be friendly to all, and have met some great people that way. And you never know where those networks will lead!

Oh yeah! It's called "competition!" A lot of stallholders, shop keepers etc can't handle it!
I am always looking at my stall and make improvements to try and differentiate myself from the other soapmakers in my area.

I have had some other soapmakers come to my stall and scoff loudly at my plain goat milk soap price. They carry on right in front of my stall saying theirs is $3.00 per bar and I was overcharging at $4.00 per bar!!

They don't actually make theirs, but buy it in from a mass producer and it conatins all the yucky stuff.
Mine is all handmade by me using qualty ingredients and I typically sell at least 24 at each market!

I just shake my head.