Top 5 Products For 2008

The list in some ways surprised me. Some products stayed the same and some were replaced with new products.


Here it is the top 5 for 2008!!!


5. Hand Milled Face Soap. All the hand milled soaps look like food and smell like food. Vanilla and Oats, Strawberry and Poppy Seed, Almond and Almond Meal, Tangerine and Poppy Seed, Lemongrass, and Kitchen Citrus.

4 All the other combination of Lavender Soaps. Lavender and Rosemary, Lavender and Lime and Lavender and Ylang Ylang.

3 Lavender Soap It is a classic. I started ordering Lavender Essential Oil in steel drums this year to be able to keep it in stock.

2 Whipped Shea Butter I’m not surprised. Trying to keep this one in stock was impossible this summer. It walked off the shelf. Compared to any other 95% shea butter product on the market it was the lowest in price. We carry a long list of scents with essential oils and fragrance oils for all different purposes and smell preferences.


1 Lip Butter I can’t believe it! This is a new recipe with sweet almond, shea butter and coco butter. Almost every order went out with lip butter in it this autumn. I even had a lady knocking on the door asking to purchase lip butter for her husband early one Sunday morning. He was heading out fishing and our unscented lip butter is the only one he uses.

Place Order Now!

Thursday the free shipping rate is going up to $100 for Canada and $120 for the USA. Also tomorrow after 5:00pm we have to count all the products in the shop for year end inventory report. Buy lots so there will be less to count.

Letter from Steve

Steve volunteered on our farm for 2 weeks. He was a great help.
Steve is also the first person to sign up for the affiliate program.

Hello Em and David,
I made it back to Toronto in one piece. The bus ride was smooth and I thank you again for the kindness of the ticket. I got my hair cut while waiting for the train in Moncton and made the train easily. The trip to Montreal was good and I slept well. They had to replace a section of faulty track in the middle of the night however and we were about three hours late arriving in Montreal. My replacement connector, I’d missed the first connector, was an hour and a half leaving, but I did arrive in Kingston to visit my friend. I arrived in a blizzard though, so it made the visit very dramatic. I arrived in Toronto on the 20th and have been visiting with family and friends ever since.
I wanted to thank you again for your hospitality and generosity. I really enjoyed working with you and learning about soap. I’m sure that my family will enjoy the gift I’m making of the soaps you gave me. I’ll encourage them to order too if they like them ;)I hope your tree is standing high and decorated now. Wish the kids a merry Christmas for me and have a merry Christmas yourselves.

All the best in the new year,

Steve.

Attitude of Gratitude

I’m very grateful for the Small Ruminant Club from the Vet College. They came while I was away and trimmed the goats’ hooves. Not only have they done a great job they left me a Thank you card and a mug of candy. I feel I’m the one that should be getting them a mug of candy but they are grateful to have a herd of goat’s hooves to trim

Free E-Book

I have been reading The Attractor Factor by Joe Vitale. I decided to look at his blog today and found a free E-Book "Give to Live". I got so involved that a forgot about Sunday dinner. Everybody ate turkey sandwich's and nobody is hungry.

Here you can get a copy.

Thank you for requesting a copy of our inspiring new book, "Give to
Live". Tell others they can have the book too! Send them to
www.givetolivebook.com Remember that giving begins with you. Go
and serve someone today. It's a great way to "Give to Live

Merry Christmas from My Co-Workers

Hanna loves to have her picture taken.
As you can see in picture 1 Tulip and Hanna are in the picture
Picture 2 Tulip is been told to leave.
Picture 3 is beautiful Hanna

FREE SHIPPING

Three days left for FREE shipping on orders over $80 in Canada and orders over $100 in the US. Order amounts will go up for free shipping January 1st.

NEW Affiliate Program

If you would like to make some extra income on the Internet helping people with their skin problems, please read on. At the bottom of our homepage on our storefront at http://www.greatcanadiansoap.com/ you will now see a link for our new affiliate program.

The program is really very simple to sign up for. It works like this, when you sign up you will be given a personal URL code (a link) that you can email to people that you know. If someone clicks on that link and creates a regular customer account with us, you will get a 5% cash bonus credited to your affiliate account provided they ordered something within 6 months of creating their account. For example, if your referral spends $100, then $5 will be credited to your account.

Finally, if your referral ever decides to sign up as an affiliate themselves, you will also receive a 5% cash bonus for all of their eligible referrals as well. In affiliate language 2 tier 10% commission.

Once you have earned at least $50, I will send you an actual cheque from The Great Canadian Soap Company. If you do not ever make it to the $50, you are still eligible to use your balance towards purchases of products from our company.

This is a very simple program and does not cost you anything to register and you may cancel at anytime. You can also check your private affiliate account and see the purchasing activity of your referrals as they happen and exactly what your balance is.

Ideally, we would like anyone who signs up as an affiliate to be a satisfied customer who is simply spreading the word to their friends and family. We do not want anyone sending out mass emails or spam to lists of people they do not know and any validated reports of this happening would result in an affiliate’s account being closed.

If you have any comments about this new program, please send them to me. I would like to hear what you think. Comments and suggestion will receive a coupon code.

Em

Boxing Day

We had a quiet Christmas this year. Well, as quiet as it could be with 3 kids.
I received an email from Steve. He made home safely with only a few set backs.
This is the first year in 40 years that all of Canada is covered in snow for Christmas.
It rained here Christmas day but the snow is still here.
I have pictures but all the batteries are in other electronic things. I will post them later.

Storm Hit the Eastern Sea Board

Yesterday we got our first major snow storm. The weather has been crazy with +17 c. days to -14c days.
Steven has left for Toronto to spend Christmas with his family. After Christmas he is going to volunteer at farms all across Canada with a friend for one year. He was a great worker. Even your cat fell in love with him.

Steve From Ontario

Steve has been here volunteering. He likes to keep busy and we kept him really busy for the last 2 weeks. Do you have that place in your space that you put all the things you do not want to deal with? We do and it is called the side barn. We cleaned it with Steve’s help. It looks and feels great

Curves and Hot Chocolate

To see if you are making any progress at Curves once a month you get weighed and measured. It was my turn to get weighed and measured at Curves this week after being on holidays.
I really did not think I made any progress but I did. Hurray!
Every day Katie has been making gourmet hot chocolates for me with rich dark chocolate, whole milk, whip cream, chocolate pieces and cinnamon. I still lost weight!!! It is a great program. Thirty minutes three times a week is all it takes. I don’t even go three times a week.

More about Shea Butter

Shea Better is a wonderful product that has helped so many of you with eczema, psoriases and dry skin. I have received many positive comments about our shea butter cream (above) and lotions. Doctors are sending their patient to buy our shea butter. Above are the 4 different jar sizes we carry. The biggest is 226 grams or 8 oz the price is $26.00 next size smaller is 113 grams or 4 oz $15.00 both are blue jars. The white jars are 56.7 grams or 2 ozs price $9.00 and the smallest is 28.35 gram or 1 oz the price is $6.00.
Best deal is the 226 gram or 8 oz blue jar at 11.5 cents pre gram.
A little Shea butter goes a long way because we do not put any filler in our creams or lotions.

To order go to www.greatcanadiansoap.com

A later post I will list the top 10 products for 2008

Shea Butter

This is a very long post. I wanted to tell you about Shea Butter and all it's benifits. The picture above is Whipped Coconut Shea Butter (good enough to eat). Our whipped Shea Butter is 95% pure Shea Butter

Shea Butter is quite recent to the Western world. It has been used for centuries in Africa. They use Shea Butter to protect and rejuvenate their hair and skin.
Shea Butter is only found in the tropics of Africa. It is extracted from the nuts of the Shea-Karite tree which begins to bear fruit after about 15 years; and can take up to 30 years to bear a quality crop of nuts with a high content of irremovable fatty acid. It is this irremovable fatty acid that gives Shea Butter its unique healing properties and makes it far superior to cocoa butter and other vegetable butters. Shea Butter is solid at room temperature although it quickly liquefies right around body temperature. Most Shea Butter comes from West Africa. Although a more soft and smoother variety from East Africa is beginning to appear on the market.



One of the great things about Shea Butter is its low melting point. When you apply it to your skin, it literally liquefies. However, one of the bad things about Shea Butter is its low melting point. It's quite possible it will melt in a hot room. It may even be melted when it's delivered to you in the summer months. If this happens, don't worry. The Shea Butter is good. Just take the lid off of the container and set it in the refrigerator until it gets hard again. In the winter months the Shea Butter lotion might be to hard to get out of the containers. Just put it into some hot to warm water for a few minutes and it will melt and be ready to use.

Shea Butter can provide relief from everything from just dry skin to many minor dermatological diseases (if you have a serious skin condition, you should see a doctor). It has been clinically shown to provide benefits. Here are some of the benefits of Shea Butter for the skin:
Daily skin moisturizer (face and body)
Dry skin relief
Dry scalp
Skin rash- including diaper rash
Skin peeling, after tanning
Blemishes and wrinkles
Itching skin due to dryness
Sunburn
Shaving cream to reduce razor irritation
Small skin wounds
Skin cracks
Soften tough skin on feet (especially heels)
Stretch mark prevention during pregnancy
Minor burns
Eczema
Sun and wind protection
Even skin tone
Reduce blemishes and scarring
Eliminating scalp irritation from dryness or chemical processing
Preventing bumps after shaving
Reducing acne (especially in combination with African Black Soap)
Absorbs quickly without leaving a greasy residue
Helps restore elasticity to skin
Restores luster to hair

Shea Butter nourishes the skin with Vitamins A, E and F. Vitamins A and E help maintain the skin and keep it clear and healthy. They are particularly helpful for sun damaged skin. They help prevent premature wrinkles and facial lines. Vitamin F acts as a skin protector and rejuvenator. It soothes rough, dry or chapped skin and helps soften dry or damaged hair. Shea Butter is high in unsaponifiables (a type of fat). Shea Butter has between 7-12% unsaponifiables. For comparison, avocado oil, a well known skin conditioner, has between 2-6%. This high level of unsaponifiables is one of the properties that makes Shea Butter so invaluable in treating the conditions listed above. Also, Shea Butter easily penetrates the skin allowing the skin to breathe and not clogging pores. Shea Butter has a high level of cinnamic acid, a natural sun screen. So, it provides some degree of protection from the sun. Shea Butter is also anti-inflammatory making it useful in treating rheumatism. While we make no medical claims about our Shea Butter, we do have anecdotal evidence that it is very useful in treating minor skin conditions. We have had several customers who have used Shea Butter for eczema and/or psoriasis and told us it works as well as steroids at a fraction of the cost and without the side effects. Recently we were contacted be a mother requesting more Shea Butter for her baby's severe eczema. While on vacation her sister pick up a jar of Shea Butter for her neice to try since enough thing else was relieving the eczema. Our Shea Butter completly cleared the eczema from the baby. The mother tried to but Shea Butter locally but the eczema came back.

Is all Shea Butter the same?All Shea Butter is not the same. Shea Butter loses some of its healing properties as it sits on the shelf, so very old Shea Butter is not as beneficial. Sometimes Shea Butter is mixed with other ingredients that reduce its benefits. Then, there are those products that add very little Shea Butter but prominently display "Shea Butter" on the label. While Shea Butter is not very expensive, you should be aware of products that claim to provide the benefits of Shea Butter and sell for very low prices. Many manufacturers are taking advantage of the Shea Butter buzz by adding a little Shea Butter to a very inexpensive product implying you can get the benefits of Shea Butter in their product

Ingredients on the label should be listed in the order from the ingredient that is the most to the least. Therefore, you should look for Shea Butter products that list Shea Butter early on the list of ingredients. You should know the ingredients before you buy any Shea Butter product and should buy from a reputable source. The more Shea Butter in a product, the greater the likelihood, you will receive the full benefits of Shea Butter.

You can get quality Shea Butter products right here greatcanadiansoap.com We carry a wide variety of products from pure Shea Butter to Shea Butter lotions, soaps and lip balm. All of the Shea Butter we carry is of the highest quality. We are very selective about where we obtain our Shea Butter and the extraction methods used. We will not accept any Shea Butter that has been extracted using solvents. You can find cheaper Shea Butter and Shea Butter products. Some of the major manufacturers are jumping on the Shea Butter bandwagon now by adding small amounts of Shea Butter to their products. Don't be fooled by this. Our pure Shea Butters are of the highest grade, from our shea butter cream to our lotions.

Mothers and Daughters Basting In The Sun

When we were in the accommodation business a few guest were on Mother and Daughter retreats. I thought when, it would so important to be able to get away with just my daughter, to spend 1 on 1 time with her. They grow up all to fast and the quality time we spend together is all too short. This fall Katie and I spent 9 days together visiting friends in a warm place. We never spend very much money we only spend time together. I highly recommend if possible getting away with your child if only for a weekend in a local Bed and Breakfast. They will remember it forever.

Food Bank Soap Donations

A customer this fall donated her free bars of soap to the local food bank. I added more to make 50 bars. I drop them off last week. It was really busy with families picking up food. Since the soap looks like fudge and I didn’t want anybody to try to eat it I told the older gentleman with bushy eyebrows and half glasses hunch over his list of names that there is tags for the soap so people will not eat it. He took a moment to look up from the desk and smiled at me and went back to his list. I imagine this year it will be hard filling all the baskets for the people that need food.

Early Christmas Present For The Goats

This summer we remodel the barn and painted it thanks to two volunteers from Red Deer. We tore out the old hay manger and grain tough. The new stall has a lot more room. The best part for me is the goats can not get out. If you have ever kept goats you know they can escape from almost every enclosure. Here is the hay manager under construction and finish with supper