Above: Windham resident Mary Phipps started Pleasant River Soap in 2004. Her all-natural handmade soaps and lip balms are available in about 30 stores in Maine and New England and were featured in an online promotion produced by Good Morning America. The two-day promotion, for which she sold her products at a 50-percent discount, generated $11,000 in sales – several times what she would normally bring in during the entire holiday season. Left: The package designs for Pleasant River Soaps’ products have garnered acclaim from the design community and caught the eyes of retailers, including Whole Foods’ Portland store. Owner Mary Phipps makes her soaps and lip balms using only 100-percent natural ingredients and uses kitchen spices such as paprika, turmeric and cinnamon to add the colors. Courtesy photos

Windham entrepreneur cleans up with soap business

WINDHAM  |  12/23/2011

By Bill Cleary

A Windham entrepreneur’s business has received national exposure and headed into its busiest holiday season ever after its products were highlighted in an online promotion by morning news show Good Morning America.

Mary Phipps, owner of Pleasant River Soap, said her company’s website received about 22,000 visits during the promotion, which ran from Dec. 8 to 10 — far exceeding its normal volume of traffic and carrying the business into its record-breaking season.

Until last December, Pleasant River Soap was a sole proprietorship and operated on a small scale. Phipps sold her handmade soaps seasonally at area craft fairs and holiday shows.

”I just knew I wanted to go more towards becoming a wholesale person, rather than just a seasonal crafter. So I began extending my presence throughout Maine and New England — and, after the Good Morning America holiday special, I believe nationally. I sold all over — it was an exciting start to a national presence,” Phipps said. ”It was amazing. It was so exciting and fun, and it was by far the biggest, neatest thing I’ve ever done with the company — absolutely.”

All participants in the Good Morning America program had to sell their products at a 50-percent discount. Even at the reduced price, Phipps sold $11,000 worth of merchandise through her website during the 48 hours the deal ran for — an amount she estimates as four to five times her typical online sales for an entire holiday season.

Phipps started Pleasant River Soap in 2004 as a hobby business driven by her

background and goals.

”I started it with the intention of producing an all-natural, handmade product,” she said. ”I kind of call myself a mad scientist — I have a school background in biology and chemistry, so I really love the scientific process. At the time, I had young children, and I wanted to make soap that was good for them.”

Over the last few years, Phipps has used other tools to increase her business’ exposure. She considers the modern era of Pleasant River Soap to have begun only a year ago. She hired Portland design firm Pulp + Wire to rebrand her products last December.

”They did everything from print design to web design — they’re amazing. It literally overnight got me noticed by huge retailers, like Whole Foods,” Phipps said. ”The retailers love the designs. They’re winning more than one international design award for the packaging — for things like how it stands up on its own in this lovely little cardboard box with a little open part at the top so you can see and touch it.”

Pleasant River Soaps’ products are now available in close to 30 stores in Maine and New England, including Blue Seal Feeds in Windham, Good Life Market in Raymond and Kennebec River Artisans in Hallowell. READ FULL ARTICLE…

Online Promotion Just Launched on GMA Website

Windham, Maine — December 8, 2011 — Good Morning America officially launched its 2011 holiday gift “Secret Deals and Steals” this morning at 8:20 a.m., and Mary Phipps, owner and creator of Maine-based Pleasant River Soap (www.pleasantriversoap.com), announced that her bar and balm sets, a stocking-stuffer-perfect duo with one bar of the artisan soap and one coordinating lip balm, were selected for inclusion in this year’s highly anticipated gift guide online promotion. The Bar and Balm sets, available in Cooling Peppermint, Lime, Orange Grapefruit, and Lemongrass, normally retail for $7.50 but are offered on the exclusive Good Morning America gift guide site (http://gma.yahoo.com/december-daily-deals–exclusive-discounts-on-gifts-for-everyone-on-your-shopping-list.html) for 50 percent off and free shipping with the special GMA code at checkout. The online promotion (http://www.pleasantriversoap.com/collections/gma) will be available through Friday, December 9, at midnight.

According to coordinators, more than 20,000 savvy shoppers are likely to visit Pleasant River Soap’s GMA-specific site over the next 24-48 hours.

“What an honor to attract the interest of a high profile, national outlet like Good Morning America,” said Phipps. “I’m thrilled to be a part of the online promotion and hope to represent well all the outstanding products that are made in Maine.”

The sets, along with Phipps’ entire line of exceptional, all-natural soaps and lip balms, are handcrafted in small batches along the Pleasant River in Maine. Made only with essential oils and the very best ingredients (no artificial fragrances, colors or preservatives), this unique line includes tempting fragrances such as Orange Cinnamon, Rosemary Lime, Almond Lavender, Fennel Poppy and more. The Maine Woods and Bay Rum scents are especially appealing to men. An added bonus: the products are vegan, an increasingly important quality for today’s environmentally conscientious shoppers.

About Mary Phipps and Pleasant River Soap
Driven by her desire to work at something she loves, dedicated to spending time with her young children, and inspired by the natural beauty of the Pleasant River near her home in Maine, Mary launched Pleasant River Soap in 2010. Marrying her science background with her creative intuition, Mary is committed to making only all-natural products with essential oils and the flawless blend of extra nutrients such as avocado, sweet almond and kukui nut oils. Pleasant River Soap products are available at area retailers including Whole Foods, Portland, Lalo Boutique in Portland, Maine Maven in Orono, and The Good Life Market in Raymond as well as online at www.pleasantriversoap.com. The popular line has been featured in high-profile outlets including TheFrisky.com; Bangor Daily News, Parent Palace, PA Live and LA Examiner. Regional and national distribution is well underway, making Pleasant River Soap poised to become the next must-have beauty product.

For more information about Pleasant River Soap products, visit www.pleasantriversoap.com.
For an interview with mom-entrepreneur Mary Phipps,
contact Ann Ewing at ann.ewing@hotmail.com or 615-419-3753.

“There are few things in life better than indulging in a little pampernig, especially if that pampering is both natural and inexpensive!” Read the full review

Thank you LA Examiner for featuring Pleasant River Soap in your Holiday Beauty Guide!  Check it out here or shop now.

By Gigi Guyton, Special to the BDN: Posted Oct. 27, 2011, at 4:13 p.m.

     

What started as a conversation over a hot cup of coffee on a cold winter’s night has turned into a full-time business for Mary Phipps. She remembers well that chat on a 2004 evening with friends.

“You’ve got a degree in biology,” they prodded her. “Why don’t you try to make some soap?”

Phipps began tinkering in the basement of her Windham home in hopes of creating an all-natural, vegan product. Before long, Phipps launched Pleasant River Soap Co., selling her soaps and lip balms at seasonal craft fairs.

Three years later, Phipps became a divorced single mother of two. “I had to decide what to do to support my children, and be around them as much as possible, so I decided to go big time.”

Pleasant River Soap Co. was accepted into Maine Made America’s Best program, and sales began to increase. By 2009, she decided to take her business even higher. “I was intrigued about the idea of being on the shelves of Whole Foods,” she said.

But there were some hurdles. “I wasn’t bar-coded. My price points weren’t competitive. I didn’t know anything about retailing. I knew I needed to learn a whole lot about business and how to officially run one.”

Phipps took two of Women, Work and Community’s classes: Basics of Starting a Business and the New Ventures Entrepreneurship Training program. During that time, Phipps knew she needed to redo her packaging to give her product a more professional look. She secured a small business loan and hired Pulp+Wire, a Portland-based graphic design, web and advertising firm.

“They redesigned packaging, redesigned my brochure, and they redesigned my website radically to what it looks like today. They did what it took to get noticed by a lot of retailers.”

The money Phipps borrowed turned out to be “more than worth it,” she said. Pulp+Wire was recognized internationally for the work they produced for Pleasant River Soap Co. The firm received awards for the packaging, logos, identity and branding.

Now it was time to get the products on the shelves of Whole Foods. She lowered her wholesale pricing, showed her new design to the Whole Foods buyer and began the process.

read full article…

So thank you to the Maine Ad Club for the recognition and mostly to Pulp+Wire for fostering our design growth and creating such an award wining brand.

Cheers,
Mary

Something really exciting happened here last month…so in case any of you haven’t heard…I am proud to announce the arrival of Todd Delaney,  National Sales Manager, to  Pleasant River Soap!  He is just as excited about my vegan bar soap and pure-nature lip balm as I am,  and, even better, he’s a super-fun guy.  Now, you might ask yourself…what could be better than adding a sales manager who believes in my products as much as I do, who’s a super-fun guy?  He also loooooves to talk about the afore-mentioned stuff!

So, all you current devotees, and those who are just hearing about us…give him a shout!  Tell him how much you love using, selling, or dreaming about Pleasant River Soap products.  And, if you’ve got questions about how to go about using, selling, or dreaming about Pleasant River Soap…perfect!  Give Todd a shout!  If you’re a chatter…207.415.1308 will get him.  If you’re a typer… todd@pleasantriversoap.com will do the trick.

Be Well and Be Clean,
Mary

Our design team crafted a “‘ye olde urban apothecary” aesthetic to reinvigorate the company’s soap and lip balm packaging. Each box allows the gorgeous, hand crafted soaps to peek through, engaging with the consumer, and features custom graphics that evoke the soap’s ingredients in a playful, cheeky manner. All packaging uses recycled papers, soy inks and wind-powered printing to complement Pleasant River’s all natural, certified animal cruelty-free products. Though initially a facelift project, we invested the time to reinvent the Pleasant River brand, addressing logo, identity materials, 12 individual soap package designs, 4 coordinating lip balms, website, Point of Purchase display and retail tags.

The Dieline is dedicated to the progress of the package design industry and its practitioners, students and enthusiasts. Its purpose is to define and promote the world’s best packaging design, and provide a place where the package design community can review, critique and stay informed of the latest industry trends and design projects being created in the field. The Dieline has quickly grown into the most visited website on package design in the world, and has become the voice of the industry.

Though initially a facelift project, we invested the time to reinvent the Pleasant River brand, addressing logo, identity materials, 12 individual soap package designs, 4 coordinating lip balms, website, Point of Purchase display and retail tags. To read more and see photos follow the hyperlink above or click through the photo below.