We Want Beer Soap

   Luckily on this day- December 5th, 1933- prohibition was repealed... otherwise, we'd be   
    making bootleg beer soap! Cheers!

What Is Georgia Grown?

We recently became a Silver Member of Georgia Grown.

The Georgia Grown program is a marketing and economic development program of the Georgia Department of Agriculture. Their No. 1 goal is to aid the State's agricultural economies by bringing together producers, processors, suppliers, distributors, retailers, agritourism and consumers in one powerful, statewide community. They want to help new agribusinesses grow, and established agribusinesses thrive.
Georgia Grown is also a brand with deep roots in sustainability, quality and integrity.  The Georgia Grown brand is desired by business and consumers who want to buy and promote Georgia’s locally grown products.*

We joined the program recently because we use as many local ingredients in our soaps as we can and wanted to support this fantastic campaign. We use Atlanta's Sweetwater Brewery beers in all of our beer soaps. We also use Wally Bees honey from Newnan, Yonah Coffee from North Ga (the only coffee grower in the State of Georgia) and stone ground grains from Nora Mill in Helen. We pick up locally grown tomatoes & carrots at our local farmers market and use some botanicals from our own garden. We are also Atlanta natives and definitely Georgia Grown girls!

There are so many local farmers markets across the state. You can find one close to you here:
http://agr.georgia.gov/community-farmers-markets.aspx

Georgia Grown

Support your local farmer!!!

There are many ways you can be a part of Georgia Grown — join now and complete your free Business Profile, become a member and promote your business as Georgia Grown!

Check out the Georgia Grown website here:  http://georgiagrown.com


*From the Georgia Grown website...

Press!

We’re excited that Jezebel Magazine included us in their June 2013 issue! Check out their blurb about our *limited edition* Porter Bar HERE

Find Us At Growler Time!

There is a new growler store at 2323 Main Street in Tucker, Ga called Growler Time! They sell craft beer, cider, and sodas. They are also selling OUR BEER SOAP!  Go try one of their many brews on tap, and pick up a bar of  our Pale Ale, Brown Ale, Blue Ale or Porter made with local Atlanta brews. Tell them we sent ya!

Global Soap Project

Thanks to the amazing support and response from our customers in our first year of making soap, we were able to make a donation to the Global Soap Project based on 2012 sales and we hope 2013 will allow us to donate more! We recently volunteered at the Global Soap Project warehouse in Norcross, Ga and wanted to share a little bit of our experience...

The Global Soap Project (GSP) collects used bars of soap from more than 1,000 hotels nationwide and recycles and distributes new bars along with hygiene education, to vulnerable populations around the world such as refugees, orphans, and disaster victims. Soap is easily available in the U.S. - not readily available in other countries. When we were at the GSP warehouse, we worked on soap bars that were headed to Sierra Leone- 160,000 bars to be exact! The GSP works with the CDC & the Red Cross to get these bars of soap to the most needy areas. 

With that being said, it is hard to imagine what this whole process looks like-  So... we thought we'd try to share it with you in a Brown Bag Soap Company pictorial...

Used soap bars from hotels are sorted according to color and type

The cleaned soap is then grated in to small pieces

The cleaned, grated soap is fed in to a processor

...and comes out on the other side like play dough...

The long bars are then cut in to 4 oz bars...

...and packed in boxes for shipping...

The bars we worked on went directly to Sierra Leone where a
 recent nasty cholera outbreak needed to be contained... 

The Global Soap Project :
“Handwashing with soap is the key to decreasing the spread of cholera and saving lives,” said Sam Stephens, executive director of the Global Soap Project, adding that just distributing the soap is not enough.
“Hygiene education will be conducted by the hospital staff so that the recipients understand how and why to use the soap to prevent the contraction of cholera,” Stephens added.

We had a great time and truly felt like we were contributing directly to a GLOBAL SOAP PROJECT...

More info and volunteer opportunities at: GLOBALSOAP.ORG
Thank you for the opportunity to contribute to such an amazing organization....

GLOBALSOAP.ORG 

Frankincense, Gold &

Myrrh Christmas! We made a special soap this holiday season with Frankincense & Gold Mica. It was sent out in some custom Christmas cards...  It turned out so nice we will make some to add to our online store! Includes Shea butter, Coconut oil, sustainable Palm oil, Olive oil, Sunflower oil, Castor oil, Frankincense & Lavender essential oils & sprinkled with gold mica flakes. Coming soon (without the gold)...

WE WANT BEER SOAP!

                                               

                                                Thankfully, Prohibition was repealed...........

          Try our Pale Ale Bar made with Atlanta's own Sweetwater Brewery 420 Pale Ale-

Dog Bar

We just wrapped our first Dog Shampoo Bar! Hannah made it at the request of a local vet with Neem oil. The vet said it is awesome for the dog's skin. Any itchy doggies out there? We've tested it on our two dogs & it is great. Leaves their fur really soft. Coming soon to the website store...

Well, we like beer...

What can we say? We are working on a new beer bar with Guinness Extra Stout, Coffee & Vanilla. We love those bars that sound so good you want to eat them-  I have used all our bars and my personal favorite is still the Pale Ale bar. I accidentally got some in my mouth recently & it tasted like honey! Not surprising since it has a bit of honey in every bar.  I wash my hair with it every day- it has such a great lather & refreshing scent- it's a great way to start the day... Can't wait to try the new Stout Bar...

                                                       Guinness Extra Stout!

Giant Bar Of Soap!

We made a giant bar of soap with shea butter, green tea, ginger, rosemary & lemon to give away at our first fall festival- Fair on the Square in Lawrenceville, Ga. next Saturday- September 8th- Come stop by our booth & hang out with Hannah, Kellie, Mary & Marlon & check out our 3 pound bar of soap. No purchase necessary. All our Facebook friends are automatically registered to win. See you next Saturday!

                                                                 Giant Bar of Soap!

Mr. & Mrs. Hepler

We are so excited to have been a part of Kellie & Chad's wedding. Much thanks to Kellie and 2TPHOTO for the wonderful experience. Congratulations!!!

                                               champagne & beer soap wedding favors

Why Beer?

Why do we use beer in our soap? 

Beer has ingredients in it that are very beneficial to your skin and hair. Beer has hops which are known to soothe irritated skin, and contains polyphenols which act as an antibacterial agent. These also provide a natural preservative. Hops contain skin softening amino acids. We've found that beer adds a great lather to the soap we make. It's even nice to shave with. 

The beers we use from a local Atlanta brewery are also some of our favorites. We don't try to hide the natural aroma of the beer itself. Instead, we add to what is already there.  Being from Atlanta, we wanted to make our beer soap with this yummy local beer!

With their Extra Pale Ale 420 brew, we've added orange & lemongrass essential oils as well as honey to accent the already hoppy, citrus notes. You won't smell like a beer- you'll just feel the extra skin softening benefits from it.

Sweetwater 420 Ale

With the Georgia Brown Ale, we add only honey and finely ground oats to this carmel honey beer. The oats alone are very soothing to the skin.  With the beer it is a very nourishing bar of soap!

 

We allow the beer to sit opened for a few days before making soap with it. This is to remove the carbonation before adding it to lye. There is no alcohol remaining in the finished bar of soap. 

We are so crazy about hops that we are working on an aftershave with hops and witch hazel and a bath brew made with- you guessed it... hops!  You can actually use our beer soaps to wash your hair. Follow that up with a beer rinse! The proteins from the malt and hops rebuild and repair damaged hair. Try a beer rinse once a month for soft shiny hair!

 

Soap Kitchen!

We are really grateful to have our own soap kitchen! Thanks to Joel at Adirondack Joe  
for retro-fitting our basement, we now have an area devoted to just making soap. It is so nice not to have all these soap making supplies cluttering up your food kitchen! Speaking of food, Carson will be at culinary school this fall in Charlotte. Maybe that's why her soap recipes have something to do with food... One of our most nourishing bars is her Pumpkin Bar. Made with Pumpkin Seed Oil and Pumpkin Butter. Anyway, here's a peek at our Soap Kitchen:

Those are a couple of just poured soaps on the work table. Our Big Bamboo Bar & a test run of a Beach Bar we've been working on. With Aloe, Coconut, Lime & Sea Salt. We also threw in some dried lime peel. 


Here's the quote for the day: 
"Soap and water and common sense are the best disinfectants." 
~William Osler

   

Soap Facts...

The making of soap is actually just Chemistry 101. Soap is a cleansing agent made from the chemical reaction of oils and fats with an alkali [sodium hydroxide- also known as lye] to produce a solid bar of soap. Soap cannot be made without using lye. When made correctly, no lye will remain in the bar of glycerin rich soap. 

                             *Here are some saturated fats such as coconut 

                                           oil,  palm oil, cocoa butter & shea butter.

                                   **Some unsaturated fats include

                                                    olive, castor, sunflower oils.

Once the fats are mixed with the lye, a chemical reaction begins to happen.   This is called saponification. - the chemical reaction that makes soap. This chemical reaction gives off heat- so much that the soap mixture will retain enough heat to create what's called a "gel stage." The soap mixture will get so hot that it almost liquefies and turns translucent. It really does look like a gel.

                                               ***This is some soap in one of our molds
                                                during the gel stage.




Some soap mixtures get hotter than others. If your recipe includes alcohol or sugar, it can overheat. This is something we've found out the hard way. We used beer and put honey in all our first soap batches. We've learned alot about making soap over the last few months. We continue to work on getting our recipes just right and testing them out on ourselves, family members and gullible friends.  

This is just a brief summary of some soap facts we've gathered so far. Oh- and the handmade soaps like the soap we make contains natural glycerin. The commercially produced soap has had the glycerin removed and used or sold elsewhere! That is one of the reasons why handmade soap is so good for your skin. The extra glycerin helps retain moisture.   

Thanks for your interest and we'll keep you posted on our progress. Smell you later! 

We Love Soap!

We love hand made soap and took a soap making class earlier this year. We have to thank Kate over at Greenstone Soap for sharing her vast knowledge with us and the other ladies in the class. We had so much fun we decided to try making soap at home. So, armed with our new how-to book and a few ingredients like Coconut Oil, Palm Oil, Olive Oil, Lye and some essential oils, we made our first three batches.  Hannah works in the beer & wine industry and wanted to try making soap with beer. It is a little more difficult to make with beer due to the alcohol and sugar content but we felt confident! (We even threw in some honey on top of all that!) So we put on our rubber gloves and got to work.

We made a batch with Atlanta Brewery Sweetwater 420 Ale, a batch with lemongrass & dried lemon peel and a batch with tea tree & lavender with lavender buds sprinkled on top. 
We only had one battery charged stick blender to mix these three batches. We didn't realize that you really need one with a plug for some turbo mixing such as this! For our last batch, we wound up mixing it with one of Carson's vintage hand mixers:

LOL! It took forever to get a trace on that batch. But all three batches turned out surprisingly nice! We just attributed it to the fact that soap making must be really easy, right? Well... as it turned out- those great first three batches must have been from dumb luck. But after that day we were hooked. One thing we all agreed on: soap making was really fun. It's been really FUN coming up with different recipes and putting whatever you want in a batch of soap and testing it out. It has also been really fun doing something together. We are all busy ladies and it is so nice to just hang out on a Sunday with my daughters, sipping champagne & making soap! 

So many of our batches look like food!

This is our lemon bar with the lemon peel. It looks like fudge! We are in the process of mixing & testing new recipes and making them available to the public. For now we are using family and friends as guinea pigs to test soap samples. We will keep you posted.


Thanks & have a clean day!