The Catskill Chronicle

WURTSBORO, NY (November 18, 2010) – Get clean and slathered for the holidays at the brand new Catskill Soap Company at 123 Sullivan Street in Wurtsboro. A grand opening celebration will be held on Friday, November 26 from 10:00 a.m. till 5:00 p.m.

The Catskill Soap Company (CatSoCo) is the brainchild of Annie Adams who began making soaps and lotions for her friends in November of 2006. For Mother’s Day of 2007, she gave “Goddess Baskets” to the special women in her life. “The soaps were shaped like a goddess, and they were glycerin so everyone got their favorite colors.”

She also made her first batch of Hand, Face and Body Cream that year. “I had no name for it, so I personalized it. For one friend it became Donna’s Hand, Face and Body Cream.” After she used it, Donna called Annie to say that she had just “slathered” it all over her body. The product now had a name – “Slather.”

CatSoCo’s current product line includes: goat’s milk soaps, lotions, lotion mists, Slathers, butters – a body butter made of mango shea butter, jojoba oil, a little bit of beeswax and fragrance) – bath salts, sugar scrubs, salt scrubs, shower gel, liquid goats’ milk soap, shaving creams for men and women, incense and oils, and hand-dipped incense.

Adams gets her goat’s milk from a homesteader in PA. “If you purchase from me, I buy more goats’ milk and you’re helping her,” says Adams. “She’s off the grid as much as she can be. She has own farm, grows her own vegetables and makes her own cheese, she sells fruits vegetables and cheese at the farmers markets. Her kids are home-schooled. She only uses enough electric for the basic things and for her Internet website.”

Adams had started making soap in 2000 when she visited a nearby craft village and fell in love with the soap maker’s wares. “I believe in the power of nature and the power of herbs, and I believe that we have everything we need to heal anything that needs to be healed.”

CatSoCo went online in 2008. Recently, Adams branched out and did shows like the Hudson River Clearwater Revival and the Falcon Ridge Festival, and just this year she was an artisan at the Bethel Woods Harvest Festival and the NY Renaissance Faire.

CatSoCo is a green company. “My soaps are made with just five ingredients and are alcohol and paraben free. They’re handmade, old-school soaps. And everything is packaged in 100% post-consumer recycled boxes, which I’m very happy about,” says Adams. The soaps are wrapped in plastic that is biodegradable and compostable, and the shred used in packaging is called Aspen Shred – a wood shred that makes great tinder or mulch.

The store is going to be half retail space, half work space, so people will be able to see Adams at work making slather and soap, creams and lotion mists. She imagines her family will be very happy to have their kitchen, dining room and mud room back. “At home I’m limited on what I can produce and make out of my kitchen. Limited by the amount of storage … my family loves me, but they’re tired of house being in constant chaos.”

In addition to the current inventory, Adams has plans for about 25 new things she wants to make and now, “I’ll actually have space to make them,” she says. Future items will include new slather recipes. “I’d love to have a customer come in and have a fragrance bar where people can sample different fragrances, and I’ll whip it up for them. And I want to do candles, diffuser sticks and things that do not have to be lighted but give off a fragrance, like linen sprays …” Adams also wants to start making non-goat’s milk slather for her vegetarian customers.

“What’s nice about my store,” says Adams, “is that visitors can build their own gift boxes. They can go around and say I want this and that and that, and there’s no extra cost for packaging.”

At the grand opening, visitors will enjoy “delicious yumminess from Kathy’s Tea Kozy – coffee, tea, hot cider, cookies and muffins all day long,” says Adams. “They’ve been incredibly supportive to me.” In fact, Adams had a holiday open house at the Tea Kozy last year.

For additional information about The Catskill Soap Company or its grand opening on Friday, November 26, visit The Catskill Soap Company Facebook page, or visit www.catsoco.com, where you can also shop online with free shipping, or call 914-424-6434.