FAQ - What do you use to make soap?

The materials that go into our soaps are pretty simple.

We use a variety of oils and butters that you have probably heard of before, and maybe have in your house right now. These are coconut oil, palm oil, olive oil, sweet almond oil, castor oil and shea butter. We then combine sodium hydroxide (lye) and water, and mix them with the oils. Oils + lye = soap.

You can't get soap without lye. Some people have fears when they hear "lye", thinking it's some sort of evil, potentially harmful chemical that can melt your skin off. I guess you could say that it is, but only to Matt and I as the soap makers, not to you as the soap users. If, in the soap-making process, we were to splash lye on ourselves, that would be bad news for us.
For the person using our soap, however, there is no exposure to lye. Really, there is not any lye left in the finished soap. When the oils and lye come together, they go through the process of saponification. The triglycerides in the oils react with the sodium hydroxide in the lye to form glycerin and alkali salts of fatty acids. Basically, we use careful scientific calculations to make sure that the amount of lye and oils are in proper proportions to ensure that all you're left with is soap (and a little extra un-reacted oil for moisturizing purposes).

Each of the oils we use has a specific purpose in the bar of soap. Palm oil helps ensure the bar of soap will be hard and stable, coconut oil adds lather, olive oil is skin conditioning, shea butter and sweet almond oil are super moisturizing, and castor oil helps make the lather creamier.

Other additives to our soaps are for specific purposes, based on what we want each bar of soap to do.

We use essential and fragrance oils to get scent into the soap. We don't use pre-mixed blends, but prefer to use scents at their most basic level, and develop scent mixes ourselves.
In the case of our mocha scent, The Beatnik Gentleman, real fresh-brewed coffee and cocoa powder help create the aroma. They also make all of The Beatnik Gentleman soaps dark brown in color.
Likewise, in The English Gentleman, we use real black tea to add scent and color.

Other friendly additives with purpose include..
-Bentonite clay - Used in our shave soap to give slip for a razor.
-Activated charcoal - Used in our extra cleansing soaps to help draw out excess dirt and skin oil.
-Rosemary, tea tree oil, grapefruit seed extract - Used in The Robust Gentleman for exfoliation. These are also commonly used in bath products for their antimicrobial, antifungal, and astringent properties.
-Oatmeal - Used in The Early Morning Gentleman for gentle exfoliation. Also believed to help soothe dry, itchy skin.
-Coffee grounds - Used in The Culinary Gentleman to exfoliate and absorb odors.

What we don't use are any animal products or byproducts, making all of our soaps vegetarian and vegan friendly. We also don't use chemicals found in many mass produced soaps, including SLS, trisodium EDTA, and BHT.

FAQ - "Are you just going to sell soap?"

We're starting out with soap, but have other men's grooming products in various stages of development.

I've developed a skin nourishing ointment/balm that we've been using like crazy over here. Jars of that are about to go out to testers this week.

Matt has set up a sharpening station and has been sharpening everything in the house that needs it. The goal here is to move on to sharpening and refurbishing straight razors.
He has also taken up woodworking. Look for hand-turned soap dishes and shave brushes coming soon.

As compliments to our soaps we also plan on offering aftershaves and colognes in various scents.

Besides all that, I wouldn't say what we already have filling up our inventory is just soap.
We've come up with four different soap recipes that are available in a number of different scents, plus a couple specialty soaps. So, whether you need extra moisturizing, extra cleansing, shave soap, or just soap for the average guy, we have you covered.

FAQ - Why did you start making soap?

This is a common question I get from friends and family when I tell them about our business.
The quick answer to the question of why is both, "because it's neat" and "for fun."

Similar to this is another common question "How'd you get started in that?"

The answer to this one is a little longer.
The story starts one morning when I announced that I would be replacing all of our purchased household cleaners with homemade kinds. These are the kinds of things I sometimes decide to do. Matt replied, "Well, if we're going to make those, then I want to learn how to make some shave soaps, too." As we said in the last post, "When we first started out with soaping, it was to create a good shave soap for Matt to use with his straight razor."

Making the household cleaners was pretty quick and non-complicated. However, we quickly learned that making your own soap "from scratch" involves quite a bit more work and research. After some quick internet reading on the subject, Matt purchased a how-to book on soaping and finished it in one day. Then began the process of collecting up supplies and materials to use. Most of the pots, measuring tools, and the like can be purchased in any old store. The oils, lye, and molds we purchased online (our "how do you make soap?" post is coming soon).

After making a couple simple batches Matt wanted to learn more, so he read a more technical and scientific book on soaping. He made his own log molds in his dad's wood shop, and he began teaching me the craft.

That's pretty much how we got started. Fast forward to now and we still think it's pretty neat, and a lot of fun.

-Nicole

FAQ - Why "Gentleman's" Soaps?

When we first started out with soaping, it was to create a good shave soap for Matt to use with his straight razor. In particular, he wanted a "bay rum" kind of scent, so that's what he first worked on.

Matt liked soaping and creating scents, and Nicole thought about making it a business. We started with a lot of market research on other handmade soaps. As it turns out, there are a lot of people out there who make and sell their own soap. What we found, however, was that most shops had only one or two "for men" soaps in a shop full of various other scents.

We didn't really like the idea of a one size fits all man's scent. Different people, be they men or women, like different things - but pretty much everyone likes to be clean. So that is the basis of our business.

We're starting with ten scents and seven styles, so right off the bat we'll have something for everyone. In the future, we hope to add more.

All of our scents are made with men in mind, but many of our soaps are really unisex. In fact, a lot of our testers are actually women Nicole works with. So, while we're not trying to leave out the ladies - a lot of our soaps are great for you, too - our shop is for gentlemen, of every style, who want to be clean.

One day, we should be adding more men's grooming products, too.

-Nicole and Matt