Soapy Hollow

As a small manufacturer that ships a physical product, I’m always concerned about my ecology footprint when it comes to shipping. That’s also true for products that are being shipped in. For instance, if I have the choice of two vendors, and one has shipped products using polystyrene pellets, and the other has used post consumer/recycle friendly fill, and an appropriately sized box, my future purchases will tend toward the vendor that used the best secondary packaging.

Dennis Salazar argues that most secondary packaging is inefficient and detrimental to the environment.

Treehugger answers the question: What Can We Do With Our Used Styrofoam?

Jackie DeLise, Vice President of Zunda Group LLC, describes the current state of affairs, gives some terminology, consumer perceptions, and some paths forward.

August 29th, 2008 | Tags: Environment, green tech, packaging | Category: Environment, IndustryNews, manufacturing | Leave a comment

It looks like Craftzine has picked up the bath bombs meme.  Bath bombs for everyone!

August 27th, 2008 | Tags: bath bombs | Category: Formulas, IndustryNews, Recipes | Leave a comment

Beauty, they say, is only skin deep. But given the load of toxic chemicals in everyday products like shampoo, deodorant, and makeup, that superficial truth is still cause for concern. With increasing frequency, studies point to hidden dangers in the medicine cabinet: things like lead in lipstick, phthalates in baby lotions, aluminum in deodorant. While the amount of each toxic may be tiny on its own, the number of products most people use each day means we’re exposing ourselves to unnecessary risks — all in the name of looking and smelling good.

In 2002, the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics — a coalition of health, labor, environmental, and consumer-rights groups — began fighting to protect people around the world from these risks, by pressuring companies to change their formulas and by raising awareness among the public. The latest tool in this effort is Not Just a Pretty Face, a book by CSC co-founder Stacy Malkan.

Malkan, a former teen beauty queen, first became aware of the impacts of routine chemicals on humans as a reporter in Colorado; after a stint in politics in Washington, D.C., she got involved in Health Care Without Harm, a global coalition working to reduce pollution in the health-care sector. It was there that she first learned of the dangers of everyday products. Now living in Berkeley, Calif., Malkan splits her time between HCWH and CSC; I spoke with her by phone about her Aqua Net-clouded past, how she’s getting the word out to women and men alike, and the most surprising thing she’s seen along the way.

question How did this book come about?

answer For five years, I was working with some of the top researchers and advocates in the field of environmental health, and seeing amazing stories, learning about the science, seeing many disturbing trends — and I just saw a great [chance to tell a story through the] people I was getting to know: women taking on big corporations, teenagers lobbying for political change, companies making safer products, chemists thinking of new, safer ways to create chemicals. There’s a lot of reason for hope, even though the topic can be overwhelming.

But it is upsetting to learn about all the toxins that we’re exposing ourselves to … through products we’ve trusted and used for years. When you start to think about all of the products you use in a day, or a week, the numbers are just staggering.

Read more for the remainder of the interview. More »

August 25th, 2008 | Tags: Cosmetics, CSC, Interviews, news, Stacy Malkan | Category: Cosmetics, Definitions, IndustryNews, Soap, manufacturing | Leave a comment

So, you may have noticed a tiny decrease in content this week. It’s because Igor starts school next week.  Were he going into the local school district, he’d be starting kindergarten. He tested in the top 1% to get into the gifted and talented academy, but it’s a long way away, they’re still doing stuff way below his level, it’s a lock-down school because of the neighborhood it’s in, and frankly, he just doesn’t learn well by rote, which is how public school is taught.

So, we’re going to try homeschooling this year and see how it goes. I’ve decided that when it comes to actual book-learning academics, we’re going to pay attention to the school calendar of our local district.  That way he starts “school” at the same time as his neighborhood friends.  Mind you, I’m pretty sure our school is more fun.  Heh.

We’ve broken out some books already, and have started refreshing what we learned before summer.

This year we’ll be doing History of the World - Part One . . . and no, not the Mel Brooks movie.

Even though the material is intended for kids about 5 years older than he is, we’ve started reviewing The Complete Book of Maps & Geography. He seems to get the spacial concepts pretty easily, and the book has lots of fun cut/glue type activities, which Igor loves.

We’ll be starting again with First Language Lessons for the Well-Trained Mind. We’ve been working on language stuff all summer, so I don’t think we need much review on the topics he seems to know.

We’ve got a couple of math books, but I’m not sure if we’ll pick one, or float between them all. He really digs flashcards too, which is great because I make a game of it, and we can take them almost anywhere.

Science; I don’t even know where to begin - we have so many science books and projects. We’ll be doing at least on project/science experiment each week.

And of course, there will be crafts. There is no avoiding crafts in this house. I’m like a crazy person, I swear I could open a craft store just on the supplies I have around the house. I cannot be trusted in a Hobby Lobby, I tell you what. So I think we’re laid in for supplies. Let the teaching begin!

How will this impact Soapy Hollow? Well…somewhat. I’m scaling back production, so there will be limited quantities of some items. I’m not accepting any new wholesale accounts at the moment. But other than that, I plan to continue tracking various legislation that impacts artisans, news about the industry, chemical updates, product updates, product testing results, development and of course, we’re going to try and have some new instructables up every week or two.

So, stick around, how else will you know when I’m making your favorite?

August 22nd, 2008 | Tags: homeschool, Igor, planning | Category: babble | Leave a comment