Teach Soap

If any of you have ventured into an outdoor show with your soaps during the summer, would you please share your experience with how the soaps reacted to the heat. Do you remember what the temperature was (approximately?)? I live in Las Vegas and you never know if it's going to be 80 or if it's going to be 105 in MAY. I've been offered the opportunity (which I have to pay for the booth) to sell my dog treats, soaps and bath bombs at a huge San Janero five day festival.

By then I figure I might have enough experience under my belt, but obviously I need to pick your brains on the temperature situation. This particular Italian food fest draws about 12,000+ people over the 5 days.

So your thoughts would be hugely appreciated.

If you have never done a market like that be sure that you are in a postion to handle the potential volume of sales and the necessary hours to man your booth during that time frame. I seriously considered doing our county fair. but it runs for almost 2 weeks and I would have to be there from 9 am till about midnight everyday of that...it was more than I could physically take on my own. And I could not count on my mom, husband or sister to be able to help, so I had to pass on that one....And the thought of the amount of stuff I would need to make for it was a bit overwhelming. I havent done any markets in the summer heat with my soaps so I cant tell you about those, it does get freaking hot down here during the summer time, heat index usually has us around 105-110.

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Dawn

I appreciate your input. It is a 5 day deal, I would be on vacation from work, I would share the booth with another gal probably, so we could take some time away from it. I have another g/f who would help man the booth. The one I would share with said she'd have to make sure her sister could help before she would say yes. We would each have a 5' x 10' space. When my Mom was alive, I would help her with shows, but they were smaller.

Manning the booth isn't the issue so much as how the soap would hold up. I would only bring enough for 2 days on any given day, and I would have the next few months to gear up for it. If I ran low from what I brought, then I would be able to go home and get more.

I don't want to do any shows this holiday, because I don't think I would have enough inventory. Anyway, anybody with "heat" thoughts, please speak up. Our heat index in the summer goes to 120, but May is lower.

I noticed with some of my CP soaps sitting out in the heat that the color faded some and some of the scent seemed to weaken also. (The fading was probably more due to the sun hitting them, but with our set-up I didn't have much of a choice). The structure of the soap, though, didn't seem to be effected by the heat.

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Carrie
Wife to my Best Friend and Homeschool mom to 7 beautiful gifts

Make sure that you have shade! At my last show, I had samples of soaps out, but I ended up putting them back in boxes as the sun's position changed. I would say it was at least 105 degrees out as I live in the desert.

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

Mine wereout in the 90+ heat most of this summer at the Farmer's Market and held up well. I wouldn't try to sell balms or butters tho!

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

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Carrie
Wife to my Best Friend and Homeschool mom to 7 beautiful gifts

Thank you so much. Knowing you were in 90 degree heat and it was okay gives me the confidence to try it. Wouldn't want all that soap to be destroyed!

I don't plan on balms or butters. I'll be having soap, bath bombs, and my dog treats at the Italian food festival. Meanwhile I'll have 8 months to get ready! My $4 "loaf" molds from Home Depot make 28-30 bars of soap at a time, so that will be helpful. This will be a great test for me for when I move to Oregon and open up my own business at Saturday Market.

Thanks for the input and please feel free to KEEP IT COMING!

It was 90+ degrees here all summer and sold lip balms. I lined the bottom of a basket with an artificial ice pack and froze it in place. Then when it was market time, the lip balms went in the basket on top of the frozen ice pack. It did have to stay out of direct sun though.

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Linda

I learn so much when I can't leave well enough alone!

I did an outdoor market at a small community south of where I live (I live in NE Colorado). A friend (who makes jewelry) and I did about every other Saturday from the end of June until last weekend. The last show was actually supposed to be today (10/6), but got cancelled because of a big cold front coming in.

At the hottest, temps were probably 90-100 degrees. Humidity level probably very similar to yours.

I cannot agree strongly enough with Irena's suggestion about shade. I invested just over $100 in a commercial grade 10 x 10 canopy. I wouldn't have been able to do the shows without it.

Interestingly enough, since I had a shady spot, the actual heat seemed to really amp up the scents in my soap. It kind of drew people over. I did not have any of my soaps in direct sunlight.

I had lip balms at the show. I had my samples in a small tray on my table, and the ones that the customers would be actually buying were in my cooler packed on ice.

A couple of suggestions for you -

Bring plenty of water. Vendors will probably charge you two arms and a leg for bottled water. I always packed several bottles in the above mentioned cooler.

If you can find them at this time of year, invest in a battery operated fan. It was a life saver for my friend and I. (I bought one for each of us.)

Get your hands on a couple of hand towels. The night before the show, soak them in cold water for at least half an hour. Wring them out, put them in a big ziploc bag, and put them in the refrigerator overnight. Before you leave the next day, put them in the cooler. There were a couple of days the heat was so intense, those cool, wet towels made a huge difference in how comfortable I was.

I should add that my soap is CP. I have no idea how something like M & P would do in the heat.

Good luck!

Anita

Have cooler will travel! Definitely would bring food and beverages! Also, the cold towels are a great idea. I usually keep baby wipes in the cooler, but never thought of the towels! I plan on mostly doing CP.

All your suggestions are encouraging to me and I appreciate it.

I do the same thing with towels, but use washcloths instead. They're also great for wiping the soap off your hands when you finish setting up.

I know you can keep the balms cool at the shows, but I didn't want it to melt in people's purses/bags while they were walking around, or if they left it in cars while they went somewhere else.

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

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Carrie
Wife to my Best Friend and Homeschool mom to 7 beautiful gifts

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

Your soaps DEFINITELY would have won out with me. I love pumpkin, but pumpkin pancakes sound disgusting and I don't eat anything with pork in it . . . it would probably kill me.

Definitely the soaps!