My soap journey began lo some 20 years ago when I helped my brother and his girlfriend sell their soap at a small farmers market in Montana. Their inspiration for starting a soap company came from the movie Fight Club. My 10 year old self was not very impressed that they were using organic vegetable oils rather than human fat for their product but nonetheless it was pretty good stuff. After a few years they decided the cut-throat world of handmade soap wasn’t for them and I was poised to take over. All of 12 years old and running my own company. My hook was a sheet of snarky answers to FAQs hanging on the front of my table at the market. If memory serves me correctly it went something like:

Yes, I made the soap by myself.
No, my mom doesn’t help me.
Yes, it's really, actually soap.
etc...

It worked too. People were drawn in by the wit of this pudgy entrepreneurial youngster and maybe their first purchase was one of pity. But customers kept coming back because the product I was making was that of actual quality. A good lesson to learn at that early stage. Business was going well...for awhile. Until one fateful day in 8th grade science. My science project to share with the class was, of course, soap and the saponification process. There was a girl in my class, let’s call her Murphy Ramirez. She was a real alpha and mean in the way only 8th grade girls can be mean. When I was done with my presentation, she leaned over to me and said “Hi, my name is Patrick Shea and I’m a fag because I make soap.” Completely devastated but not to be outdone, I snapped back “Hi, I’m Murphy Ramirez and I’ll be pregnant at 16.” Thus my soap making days came to an end. If it was soap that gave me away that easily, soap had to go... We were both wrong by the way. She would get pregnant much sooner than 16 and I’m not a fag because I make soap, I’m a fag because I like dudes. I’ve found nothing in the soap making process to be inherently homosexual...yet.

Fast forward nearly 2 decades. 6ft tall, devastatingly handsome, and no longer concerned if making soap is gay, I got the itch to start again. I had to start completely from scratch. I could barely remember anything about my original recipe other than the combination of oils. After several humorously failed attempts (lopsided, too short, abstract sculpture art?) I finally arrived at a decent bar and began giving it away to friends. My original intention was just to give myself a fun hobby and have built-in Christmas presents for my family. However, I started to get a common feedback: “You should sell this, it’s really good.” So, here we are. Like a phoenix from the ashes my soap empire rises again. Eat shit Murphy Ramirez :)