Stephanie Bolz’s business is called Hoppy Soaps. Bolz just sold her last bar of lavender soap at the Ann Arbor Sunday Artisan Market. The lavender scent Bolz created is what her customers love the most. All the products created by Bolz is done by scratch. To create all of her soap bars, she uses the cold-process soaps.

“That means you use sodium hydroxide and a liquid,” Bolz said. “I use beer for my soaps and I brew the beer myself. And then you mix your lye liquid solution with oils. In my soaps I use all vegetable oils and vegetable butters.” She has been at the Artisan Market since mid-summer. Thanks to her high-selling lavender-scented soap bars, her business has been going well.

Bolz does not just sell hand crafted bars of soap; she also sells hand crafted bath salts and bath bombs. “Bath bombs essentially consist of a mix of baking soda and citric acid,” Bolz said. “The combination of the different pH levels create a fizzing reaction when water is applied. When they come in contact with water they create a fizzing reaction.” She adds shea butter as well for a little bit of moisture and then essential oils and some colors. Bolz normally stays with pastel colors like light blues and purples for her bath bombs. However, the bath bombs and salt don’t bring in the sales that she would like to see.

During the fall and winter Bolz has created pumpkin, halloween and candy cane scents. The scent that Bolz favors the most is the chocolate epistles soap bar. Because Bolz uses beer as her liquid to create the soaps, she also has beer-scented soaps like the Striped India Pale Ale Soap or the India Pale Ale soap which have a more manly smell to them.  Even with Hoppy Soaps just starting out at the Ann Arbor’s Sunday Artisan Market, Bolz is slowly building her clientele and has high hopes for her business in the future.