A day in the life of The Soapworks

We haven't had time to post on the blog, Facebook and Twitter just lately - sorry, but it's because we've been so busy!   Mother's Day orders definitely kept us on our toes this year, and we're very pleased that everything went out quickly and the feedback has been so positive.  Thank you for taking the time to get in contact!

Lots of customers often ask us what it's like to work at the Soapworks, so we thought it might be interesting to give an insight into what goes on behind the scenes.  This is what we were up to yesterday....

It was an early start, to continue working on the re-design of the Natroma range.  Workshop customers have already spotted that we're changing the Natroma soap labels.  It involves lots of re-design work to change over each individual label, but we're trying to get it done asap.  Next it's onto answering e-mails and dealing with queries from wholesale customers. It's going to be a busy day since we have to get a large order of hampers ready, so help is on hand from a family member....always much appreciated!

Oops!  Is that the time....11am, so must open the shop.  Quickly turn on all the lights and discover that we already have a few customers waiting outside.  Spend some time advising them about which soaps to choose, and help some lovely ladies select some dowsers (we're expanding our range of natural crystals in our Stourbridge shop).  Then it's onto wrapping a hamper for another customer followed by some sales of bath bombs and one of the lovely new humming birds (just in, beautiful Swarovski crystal enhanced light catchers which we'll be adding to the Natroma website).

In the middle of serving customers, a delivery arrives so I have to man-handle a very large, heavy box out of the way....will have to check that everything's arrived ok later on!  Back to customers again and I'm wrapping another hamper with pretty Easter colours.  At last there's a break in shop customers, so I can switch to looking at the internet orders that have arrived so far today.  Thankfully everything's in stock, so it's just a matter of packaging everything up and printing out the dispatch labels.  Behind the scenes it's a hive of activity with freshly made fizzing butter melts being packaged, and soaps being labelled for the hamper order.

We have a visit from our Ruskin Glasshouse College students.  It's their last day of term so they've popped in to say goodbye, and we wish them well over the Easter break.  They've worked really hard and have enjoyed their work experience with us, and will be back again after the Easter break. 

Phew, where has the day gone?  It's 1.45pm and we haven't had lunch yet!  So there's just time for a quick sandwich before some more customers come into the shop.  I have a lovely conversation with some customers about using the soap, and then help another with selecting some nice essential oils to use around the house.   Another customer chooses some of our new fair trade floating candles (again these are new items that have just arrived, that will be added to the Natroma website soon), since they're lovely as small gifts.   Then it's back to preparing those hampers for the order that has to go out tonight....running out of time, don't panic!

Just as we're catching up on the hampers, more customers come into the shop.  Spend a little time advising about the Natroma skincare range and then it's back to finalising the internet orders.  Finally have everything done, so Paul heads off to the Post Office and we continue adding ribbons to those hampers!  It's 5pm, and at last the hampers are ready, so Paul returns and packages them into a shipping box.  He then heads off again for a journey into Shropshire to deliver the hampers.  We wouldn't usually personally deliver orders ourselves, but it's a lovely customer and the Bank Holiday meant we can't use a courier.  So since the hampers have to be there by Good Friday, it's time for the personal touch to make sure they arrive on time!

Back in the workshop, there's just time to place a last minute order for some items we'll need next week, and then we have a quick tidy before finally closing the shop.  I never did get around to checking off that order, so it'll have to be done in the morning.  It's now time to go home since it's after 7pm and there are some hungry cats waiting for their dinner!! 

New Spring Gift Hampers!

We've just uploaded some lovely new gift hampers onto the Natroma website.

Cherry Blossom Hamper by Natroma

Inspired by Spring, these bright and colourful gift hampers are wrapped in luxurious patterned organza or lace ribbons, and are finished with delicate cherry blossom flowers.  We've made sure they contain some of our most popular handmade goats milk soap and bathing products: hand decorated natural goats milk mini soap slices, pretty petal bath bombs and of course our ever popular organic fizzing butter melts! 

We've also included some Lip Silk organic lip balm in our Cherry Blossom Hamper - invaluable at this time of year, when lips are still feeling sore due to the colder weather.



Springtime Hamper by Natroma

We hope that the Relax, De-Stress and Exotic Rose themed hamper contents will offer gift recipients some much needed relaxation.  Other options include a new Exotic Hamper containing products enriched with Monoi de Tahiti and exotic essential oils including Ylang Ylang, Frankincense and Patchouli.  We think these hampers would be great for Mother's Day or perhaps as thoughtful calorie-free Easter gifts. 

The reaction from customers in our Stourbridge shop is that they look too pretty to open, but fingers crossed the products will be used...eventually!

Busy with some great gift ideas!

The Soapworks has returned back to normal now, and we've been really busy making loads of soap and trying to re-stock our Stourbridge shop!  It seems like everyone is running out of their favourite bathing or skincare products at the same time, so it's been lovely to see so many customers again and have a nice chat....but apologies if we sometimes have empty spots on the shelves!

Behind the scenes we've also been busy working on some new hampers for Mother's Day and the spring.  After all the reds and golds of Christmas, it's been lovely to work on some new hampers with bright Spring colours which would also be great low calorie gift ideas for Easter too!  More information will follow, once the new hampers have been photographed and uploaded to the websites.

Stourbridge customers will also be interested to know that we have some lovely new crystal pieces, tumblestones and jewellery available.  As usual these are hand picked one-off pieces, so we hope that you like them.

Sorry - closed due to the weather

Following heavy snowfall in the West Midlands today, we have been advised that the Ruskin Glass Centre will be closed on Saturday 19th January 2013.  The Centre car park has a covering of snow, and it won't be possible to clear the car park and driveway so it can be gritted to safely allow vehicle access.

We were unable to open today, so we have taken the decision to be closed during the coming days until conditions improve.   We will review our opening hours for the coming week on Monday 21st January, and will post the information here on our blog to ensure customers do not make unnecessary journeys to Stourbridge.  We apologise for any inconvenience caused.

A number of website orders were posted today, but we were advised by Royal Mail that there won't be any postal collections from the Birmingham area until Monday.   This means that all orders that were placed on our websites by 2pm on Thursday 17th January have been dispatched, but it is likely these orders may take an extra couple of days to arrive due to the disruptions to postal collections in our area.  Our thanks to website customers for your patience.

Fingers crossed everything will return to normal again, early next week!

UPDATE:  w/c 21st January 2013, we'll be opening our shop a little later than usual this week.  See the information on the right, for times for each day.

Thanks for all the good wishes over Christmas!

We're finally back to work after an extended Christmas break this year.  Phew! what a busy year 2012 was, and we really needed a little longer to recover.

So we just wanted to say thank you to everyone who's contacted us since Christmas to wish us well, say thanks and pass on lovely feedback about how gift recipients raved about their natural skincare goodies!  It's so lovely to hear that people appreciate what we do, so thank you so much for taking the time to write to us, or pop in for a chat now that we're open again.

Stourbridge customers who call in will see that our shop is looking very depleted at the moment....we're re-stocking and manufacturing as quickly as we can!  So if customers need anything urgently please don't hesitate to get in contact since we'll be happy to advise on product availablity and timescales for items that need to be made.

We also wanted to remind everyone that now that it's quieter, we'll be returning to our usual shop opening hours - 11am to 4.30pm Tuesday to Saturday. 

Merry Christmas from everyone at The Natural Soapworks!

Merry Christmas everyone!  We hope you enjoy a peaceful and restful holiday this year.

For us, it's been a really busy year right to the last...even though our shop was supposed to be closed on Christmas Eve, we still had to pop in to finalise one last order!   But finally the last products have been made and the last hampers wrapped and sent out, so it's time for the elves to take a well earned rest.  We hope you enjoy all of the lovely fragrant handmade goodies that are hiding under a great many Christmas trees this morning!!

We're now going to take an extended break over Christmas and the New Year.  Our Stourbridge shop will be closed until Tuesday 15th January 2013 - we've tried to tell as many customers as possible that we're closing for a little longer than usual this year, and apologise for any inconvenience.  While we're away we'll still be responding to urgent queries by e-mail.

Our web shops will continue to accept orders over the Christmas break, and we'll make sure they're processed as soon as possible when we return to work.  Website orders will be processed in the date order they arrived, and we hope to begin shipping orders again during week commencing 7th January 2013.  We will be contacting customers by e-mail, to advise on likely shipping timescales for any items that require manufacture.

But for now, we hope everyone relaxes and has a lovely Christmas.  Enjoy!

Last orders for Christmas!

Wow, what a busy few days it's been! 


A Candlelit Soapworks

The Ruskin Glass Centre's Candlelit Shopping Evening was really lovely, but anyone visiting our shop found that we were rather busy with a constant queue at the checkout all evening!  The Centre looked fabulous with low lighting, and we're so pleased that everyone enjoyed the evening...complete with mulled wine and mince pies of course.  It was a cold night after all - just look at the icicles that formed in the Courtyard's Fountain!


Icy Flowform Fountain

Last week was our busiest for Christmas orders, and we're pleased that everything has been dispatched, so loads of fragrant goodies are on their way!  This year we've heard that postal timescales have been pretty good, with many items arriving within a couple of days of dispatch so hopefully most parcels will have arrived by now.  But it's now getting so close to Christmas, that we can no longer guarantee that internet orders will arrive before the big day.  However as orders arrive, we'll continue to send them out as usual in the hope that some arrive on time.

At our Stourbridge shop, there's still a good selection of festive gift hampers available although a few items are very limited now.  The Fizzing Butter Melts have sold out (as usual!) so we'll only be making these to order now - and they take a day or so to dry so this will cause a short delay.

This year our shop will be closing at 4pm on Sunday 23rd December.  We'll be taking a well earned extended Christmas break this year and will be closed for 3 weeks so we can re-charge the batteries.  We'll re-open again on Tuesday 15th January 2013.  During this time our webshops will continue to accept orders, but they will not be processed until after we return.  So if you need anything urgently, we'd suggest that you place an order asap or call in to see us in the coming week so you don't run out.