Refuge Soap Company

Simplicity. One of the best decisions I made early on in my soap-making venture was knowing my niche. There are a lot of artisan soap makers out there, and most of them are constantly preoccupied with creating visually appealing products. Some of it is quite impressive and some of it is awfully cute. One thing’s for sure - it isn’t me. So if you want a bar of soap that looks like a psychedelic swirl of colors or has a crust of flower petals on top, there are plenty of options. If you just want soap that’s all natural and made with high quality ingredients, that smells great and makes your skin feel good, I got you.

Some fresh-squeezed orange soap for you! This is the first batch that will go on sale this spring!

https://instagram.com/p/C3-nj1axAQF/

I must say, these are some nice looking (and smelling) bars of soap.

Annatto-infused sunflower oil for my Rufous bath soap. It would be very easy to stir some bright orange dye into my finished soap batter and call it good. This way takes more time. It takes more patience. In my opinion it’s also the right way to do it.

First batch, scented with ylang ylang, geranium and sweet orange essential oils is curing now. All natural all the time.

I finally broke out of the rut I’ve been in and made the first batch of soap at my not-so-new place. This simple olive oil soap will be for my personal supply, but you know, that thing about inertia is also the tendency of an object when in motion to stay in motion. The ball is rolling now.

Inertia. It’s a real thing. In case anyone may be at all curious about what’s happening with the one man soap factory, I have been planning to launch Refuge Soap Company v3.0 here in the beautiful Sierra Foothills, but you know, there’s this whole thing about the tendency of an object when at rest to remain at rest. I didn’t have the time or energy to enter the fray of the holiday gifting season this time around (especially since part of my day job is being bludgeoned by Christmas for a month straight), and since my local municipality issues business licenses by the calendar year I told myself I’d get right on that January first. But now January has nearly come and gone and I’ve yet to take the first step. Maybe running out of my personal supply and having to buy soap at the store for the first time in years will motivate me. When I do get the ball rolling again, there will still be this whole business of waiting 4-6 weeks for things to happen. Long story short, Refuge Soaps should be back on the market maybe by the beginning of spring, probably with an updated website and maybe even some new varieties. I’ll keep you posted.

Every now and then I need to make a batch just for me. This simple olive oil soap, scented with tea tree oil, is strictly for my personals.

This post is very late, but you know what they say, better late than never. 2022 was not a great business year for Refuge Soap Company and I was only able to make one modest donation, but I’m happy to say that it went to a great place. Malheur Field Station facilitates environmental education in the Northern Great Basin through various programs available to the public, and also provides the unique opportunity for members of the public to find lodging just a few miles down the road from the Malheur NWR headquarters. The field station has major projects underway to upgrade their facilities and infrastructure, so every dollar counts. Thank you RSC customers for your continued support!

I’ve been birding Malheur NWR for the past few days, and I’ve enjoyed using the Harney County Public Library in Burns as a place to charge my devices and download photos to my laptop. Of course I’ve also enjoyed seeing locals come in to use their pleasant little library. These two Osprey daypacks caught my eye since I have a couple of Osprey daypacks myself, and when I saw what they are - explorer kits that local kids can check out from the library - I just thought it was the coolest thing! Decided to share this on the Refuge Soap Company page because the two organizations who sponsored this were the first two recipients of donations of proceeds from the sale of RSC products. I think little things like this are great!

Whipping up some all-natural olive oil soap scented with lavender and bergamot essential oils, the first of several batches for my donation to local migrant farm workers. Spoke to my friends at Western Farm Workers Association, the grassroots organization that facilitates this outreach, and learned that this weekend they’re making a major food donation - hundreds of pounds of fresh eggs, milk, produce and dried staples - to multiple locations in the tri-county area where I live. I’m excited that they’ve invited me to come out to the camps to make my donation in person.

Inventory is sold out, and the last order will ship out tomorrow. Things will be going into storage soon, but first I have some extra batches of soap to make to honor my pledge for matching donations. Thanks so much for your support friends! I’ll keep you posted with any new developments when Refuge Soap Company comes out of summer hibernation.