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In The News...
Seen in the Portage and Beaver Dam Newspapers
Good, clean fun
By SHANNON GREEN/Capital Newspapers
Mon May 19 2008
PORTAGE - Not everyone can admit they bring good clean fun into people's lives, but Joy Wilson does that every day.
Wilson is a soap maker. She sells her homemade soaps at local farmers markets and craft fairs, including Portage, where she was Thursday. Her business, JoyFare, is operated out of her home in Fox Lake.
Wilson began making soap for a practical reason - she loved homemade soaps, but they were too expensive. Already into crafts, the step into soap-making was an easy one for her.
"It was kind of natural," she said.
She got a book about making soap at home and plunged in.
"I never had chemistry - I had to learn it," she said.
She uses the "cold process" method to make her soap. Her ingredients - most of which come from Wisconsin - are room temperature. In a large kettle, she adds ingredients after weighing them, and stirs them with an electric stick blender. As a blend of lye and oils, the mixture heats up to about 100 degrees.
Depending on the "flavor" of soap, she will use goat's milk; a variety of oils including olive, palm, coconut and hemp; shea butter; or, in the case of her Wisconsin Beer Soap, Leinenkugel's Creamy Dark beer.
After the mixture thickens, she adds the fragrance - essential oils or specially made soap fragrances - and minerals, flowers or spices that color the soap.
When the mixture is ready, she pours it into her molds, which can create 15, 30 or 48 bars, and lets it cool and harden overnight. After the bars are cut, stamped and labeled, they are ready for sale, although she typically lets them cure for several weeks.
There's a "flavor" for every purpose, making the choosing difficult. The types range from essential oil blends — including patchouli, lavender and rosemary, lemongrass and mint lavender — and fragrance blends that include cinnamon apple, milk and honey oatmeal, lilac, chamomile and the spicy cranberry Bucky Berry.
She experiments with new blends of scents, making a smaller batch to see how well they turn out. The beer soap is a blend of fragrances that are not too sweet, although she will not divulge all the ingredients.
"It's a secret," she said.
Some of her blends have caught on, such as Gardener's Soap that contains ingredients that repel insects, including lemongrass, citronella and eucalyptus. Her Fox Lake Fisherman's soap has anise, which masks the human scent and acts as a fish attractant, according to Wilson.
The soaps can also be used as shampoo.
"You can use a lot of different ones (for shampoo)," she said, although she does offer a specially made type simply called Shampoo that lathers especially well.
"People like lather," she said.
Not all the scents are flowery and feminine. Packer Backer uses lime and lemon. Wilson has noted that men typically like Vanilla Bean.
"It has a nice, neutral smell to it," she said.
Wilson won't admit to having a favorite scent.
"I like them all," she said.
She's now in her ninth year of operation.
"It sort of snuck up on me," she said.
The soap is marketed under the name Eve, "because of the Garden of Eden," Wilson said. She sells her product at $4.50 per bar or $12 for three.
Her husband, Jeff, helps her with the graphic design and marketing.
The soaps are sold at some area stores, including Julie's Java in Columbus and The Vineyard Books and Gifts in Beaver Dam. She also has a customer as far away as Chicago.
The soap is available online as well at evesoap.com. She also offers homemade lotion, lip and hand balm, roll-on perfume, soy candles and bath tea.
Wilson has discovered that many repeat customers order through her Web site.
Kathleen Sullivan of Portage is a regular customer at the Portage Farmers Market, and looks forward to seeing Wilson's soaps.
"I love them," she said Thursday. "The smell is wonderful. You almost could eat it."
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