A Refreshing Start

I just love the new year. It brings so much hope for change. It is just a new day and a turn of numbers but it always feels so much more than that. It is refreshing!

2014 was a great year for MO River Soap. The sales and numbers still make my head spin. (It is tax time you know.) The holidays were a rush which was mostly fun but also exhausting. I packed my last order about a week prior to Christmas day and I abandoned my soap room for almost two weeks. Many fellow soapers rushed back to work and I have enjoyed seeing their progress. For me, I felt like I was on vacation and truly SEEING my kids and husband for the first time in months. The rat race completely took over my life. I am blessed beyond words that the business was so successful and that my husband and kids were right there supporting me. There were a lot of late dinners made by my husband and several nights of just cereal for dinner. Once things calmed down, I got back in the kitchen and my kids seemed amazed that I still remembered how to cook. Seeing the excitement in their eyes, that they had their mom back, was pretty darned humbling. As best as I tried to balance the business and my home life, the business won out every time. Again, I am blessed to have such wonderful customers and blessed to have so much interest in my YouTube videos, Facebook page, etc.. However, it's time to shift the load into a different direction.

I am very excited to move forward in this year. Thanks to a wonderful holiday season, this hobby business of mine now supports itself. I will have to be very cautious in my spending to keep it that way. I have a whole wall of fragrance oils but it is never enough is it? My husband often suggests I just use up what I have. It just doesn't work that way does it? :-)

My goal this year is to take it all at a little slower pace. My home responsibilities will have to be first. I can pour my heart and soul into this when my kids have left home and I am suffering from empty nest syndrome. I am still very happy to create and offer my creations to you all. I am a soaper through and through and will experience some seriously ugly withdrawals if I don't make it. So you're in luck there! I will still be designing and creating wax melts for you as well.

This year's theme will be "ME...only simpler". We'll have less crazy color (some soap got a little wild last year) and more solid color. We'll have more basic designed soap that I adore and less swirly swirls. I will still be doing some fun designs and swirls as one can't totally leave that behind. I'm not going all natural here! I'm just simplifying a little bit.

You'll see some packaging changes. I get bored easily so I enjoy changing it up. I do think I'm totally over shrink wrap and glycerin soap embeds though.

You'll see better lighting in my videos, a drive for better quality videos, and fewer so-so videos. I have so many videos on my channel and it's just all the same stuff. I know many of you love it no matter what but I'd love to switch it up a bit if I can.

Big Cartel is so 2014 and I have closed down my storefront there. The issues I had with Big Cartel during the holiday season certainly left a bad taste in my mouth. I think they are user friendly and for the most part are an awesome platform for selling. I just don't think it can handle the fast and furious hits that I put it through when I opened for a new listing. Most of my selections sell out within the first 20 minutes. It is not because I didn't have the stock behind it, as I most certainly did. I will temporarily return to Etsy (link above) until we are ready to move forward with my actual website.

I thank all my wonderful customers and fellow soapers for a fabulous 2014 and LORD willing, 2015 will be even better. Quality over quantity! WOO!