Posted On: March 3, 2021 by Community HealthCare System in: General
Carol Perry is an LPN in the Onaga clinic. She has worked at CHCS for almost 30 years. She started as a nurses aide on the acute floor in 1991, then graduated from nursing school in 1995.
Carol also makes soap with her sister, Gail Wege. Their business is called Route Step Farm. Gail retired from the military as a Lieutenant Colonel after a 20-year career and moved back to the Onaga area with her family. Gail started making soap as a birthday present to herself about seven years ago. “Working with lye for the first time was scary. I actually made my first bars of soap on the porch of mom and dad’s house. After I survived that experience, I was hooked,” Gail said.
Carol and Gail’s mother, Loretta Wege, provides more than just her porch. She helps “wrangle kids” while Carol and Gail are making soap, and she helps cut and wrap the finished soaps.
Carol and Gail recently took time to answer a few questions about their soap.
What do you enjoy about the soap business? Do you make other products?
I love having the freedom to experiment with the different ingredients and scents to make a soap for specific needs such as dry skin, eczema, or just to have a sudsy soap with a fresh or holiday scent. Not all of the scents or soaps have turned out as expected. We started with just one recipe for our soap, and over the years, we have mixed and experimented with different ingredients, recipes, and techniques to get a basic bubbly bar that our customers love. We do change up the ingredients depending on specific requests. Winter time brings out the more moisturizing ingredients like cocoa or mango butters. Soon, we will be adding goat milk and honey lotions to our line of soaps. This will allow our customers to match their favorite soap with a favorite moisturizing lotion scent.
What makes your soap special? Where is it available for purchase?
Our soap is artisan, hand-crafted, single-batch. Nothing is made in bulk, and all the ingredients are as natural and skin-loving as we can get them. The addition of goats to the farm has also allowed us to create an amazing goat milk soap. Mama B, our hand-milked Nubian goat, is very proud of her work! Goat milk soap is rich in proteins, vitamins, and minerals, and goat’s milk has been valued since ancient times as a moisturizer and healing skin treatment. It’s also loaded with capric and caprylic acids, which reduce alkalinity and provide a pH level very close to the skin’s natural levels. Goat milk is packed with vitamins, such as A, B1, B6, B12, C, D, E, and minerals such as zinc, copper, iron, selenium, etc. Apart from that, it also includes fatty acids, amino acids, citric acid, antioxidants, and enzymes.
You can check out our soaps at www.routestepfarm.vet or call us and stop by the farm to see what we have on hand. We also sell soaps at local craft shows, and a selection of soaps is for sale in the CHCS Coffee and Gift Shop in Onaga.
We also take custom orders for specific needs (no scent, colloidal oatmeal, etc.). And we may have extra milk available in a couple of months if anyone is interested in trying goat milk!
What advice do you have for people interested in developing their own business?
Make goals and a budget, and stay focused. Revisit your goals and always be ready to make changes. Find out what your customer needs/wants. Make a brand statement and know what drives your passion.
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