“You know, work is work,” she said, “but I can come home and work down in the soapary for hours. It helps me clear my head.”
Santoro, 54, only uses all natural substances in her soaps so there is nothing to strip the skin. She said that when commercial soaps are made, the makers skim the top for the glycerin that forms because it is a profitable byproduct. They then add extra chemicals, such as parabins, sodium laural sulfates, and phthalates that are not good for the human skin. There has been much debate over phthalates health risks, and scientists have found that women’s exposure to them can cause birth defects of their male fetuses. In most antibacterial soaps is a chemical called triclosan, which is known to cause cancer. The skin will start to absorb the harsh chemicals due to constant use of the commercial soaps.
Instead of skimming off the glycerin, Santoro keeps it in her soaps because it is part of the cleaning power of soap. She said oils bind to oils, so the oil from the glycerin sticks to the oils on the skin to pull them off. Therefore, the skin is left feeling smooth, moisturized, and clean.
“I couldn’t use a regular bar of soap if you paid me,” said Santoro. She is extremely careful to not use any harmful preservatives when making her soaps. Some of main ingredients used at Soapworks are soybean, castor, olive, hemp, palm (she makes sure it’s not trees from the rainforest), coconut, Shea butter, and grape seed. Santoro also adds a lot of fresh herbs and flowers for extra exfoliation and fragrance.
She first started playing around with soap making when her sister passed away in 2000. It was her way of diverting herself from the situation. None of the commercial soaps had what Santoro was looking for so she went online and found a recipe to make her own. With a few changes here and there, she now is an expert at the craft and can make 500 pounds of natural soap in just two days.
Santoro starts with either a goat milk base or a coconut milk base and mixes it with oils. In order for them to “marry”, as she calls it, she pours in sodium hydroxide and lye to cause the chemical reaction of burning the sulfate, which combines the oil and milk. Essential oils and fragrances are added and the mixture is poured into soap logs where they sit for a few days. Santoro then hand cuts the logs into 5.5 ounce bars and they have to sit for three weeks before they can be put on the shelves.
One of her newest recipes is the Egg-Head Shampoo bar, made with beer and eggs. “I have always wanted to try beer in my soaps because in the 1970s it was all the rage to wash your hair with beer because it adds body and shine,” Santoro said. She bought Atlantic Amber beer and let it go flat. She used it as a base and added eggs, tea-tree oil, and geranium oil.
For all of the vegans in the world, there is even a line of soaps out there for you. Santoro uses a base of coconut milk for those soaps because a lot of people don’t want anything with animal products. The top-selling vegan soap is “Happy Hippie Treehugger” which is scented with, as she puts it, “the most popular scent of the sixties” and green tea.
In order to have her soaps be considered certified organic, she would have to go through a long three year process, so for now she is sticking to the naturally grown ingredients. The National Organic Program has strict rules for the process of becoming certified organic and how to go about apply for certification. Businesses must submit the type of operation they are running, a history of substances that have been applied to the land in the past three years, the products being grown or processed, and an organic system plan. Once the company is certified, annual inspections are performed by the United States Department of Agriculture.
By choosing to stay all natural, final products made only from botanical resources, Santoro can sell her products at a cheaper price. Certified organic soaps can range anywhere from a hefty $8-$10 a bar. Inside the small shed at Sunflower Farm where she has set up shop, she sells her soap for just $3.50 a bar or three bars for $10.
“Business has been good. My prices are good, it’s natural items, and people like my stuff,” Santoro said. “We’ll really see an increase in sales when the famers markets open.”
As the largest natural soap maker in Connecticut, Santoro also makes all natural lotions, body butter, a dog shampoo, poison ivy relief bar, and soy candles that can double as massage oil when melted. She runs a farmers market in Milford in the summer and her soaps may be sold in Whole Foods Stores in the near future, as they have approached her about selling in the store. If you are interested in Santoro’s products, her shop is located at 767 Derby Milford Rd. Orange, Conn. or you can visit her website www.sunflowerfarm.com.
Photos courtesy of http://www.sunflowerfarm.com/
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