A Publication of The Indie Beauty Network
ISSN 1530-9630 | Volume 7, Issue 14
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1. IBN Member Update: Welcome New & Renewing IBN Members!
2. Lifestyle CEO Report: Special Guest Andrew Sherman, Esq. Joins Me!
3. Handmade Beauty Trivia Question: win something wonderful!
4. Feature Article: Do You Pooka?
5. Products Liability Insurance Update

Handmade Beauty Recipe of the Week: Rich Butter Blend

\Life.Style CEO\n. A person who owns and manages a business, not solely for financial gain, but also to enjoy the personal rewards of entrepreneurship, independence, flexibility and fun.

Upcoming Lifestyle CEO Internet Radio Shows:

April 3: Leslie Morgan Steiner, author of the anthology Mommy Wars: Stay-at-Home and Career Moms Face Off on Their Choices, Their Lives, Their Families, and I will talk about the issues facing people (that's gender neutral, in case you didn't notice!) who are juggling parenthood and something else. What is that "something else?" Well, it's different for everyone but for some reason, it seems to generate quite a bit of unpleasantness and controversy among the jugglers. Leslie will join me to talk about why this is, and how choosing self-employment might be a good middle ground for parents everywhere.

May 22: Author Rachel Hamman joins me to talk about her new book Bye-Bye Boardroom: Confessions From a New Breed of Stay-at-Home Moms. Rachel talks about her interviews with moms all over the country (including me!) who abandoned the corporate board room to have more family time and own their own businesses.

Please read the contest rules here before submitting your entry. Put "TRIVIA CONTEST ANSWER" in the subject line or your answer will not be considered. While time does not permit me to respond personally to all entrants, the winner's name will be announced in the next newsletter!

Updated September 27, 2007. Download or stream my interview with Pooka's founder Dawn Fitch at Indie Business Radio.

Imagine going into a branch of the nationwide Whole Foods Market chain of natural product stores store and seeing your products on their shelves! For IBN member Dawn Fitch and her company Pooka Pure and Simple, it’s more than just an over-active imagination! To make sure she’s not dreaming, the amazed Dawn pinches herself as she stands in the aisle looking at her products and remembering how it all began.

Dawn began making products with the help of her sister Donna and two college friends, April Reeves and Tricia White, who pushed Dawn to sell the products at a local fair. “It was our first fair and we sold out! she says.” “That’s when we knew we had a business.” So the four “Pookalitas” (more about the name later) founded Pooka Pure and Simple.

Elbowing In For a Foothold

Like a number of IBN members who began making their handmade products because of their own or family members skin sensitivities or health problems, Dawn was quite ill a few years back and it took a while, but she was finally diagnosed hyperglycemic. Her doctor told her to start reading labels on her food so she wouldn’t consume sugar and things that were bad for her. Reading the ingredients helped her become aware of how much is consumed that is saturated with unhealthy, unnatural ingredients.

She changed her health routine and started reading labels on the body products she used, because she read an article about how what goes on your skin also goes into you body’s system. During the search for what was wrong with her physically, Dawn began to explore aromatherapy and its healing and relaxing attributes. She began making products with the help of her sister Donna and two college friends, April Reeves and Tricia White, and they pushed Dawn to sell the products at a local fair. “It was our first fair and we sold out! she says.

Dawn’s first product was Elbow Grease. “I found so many people were using petroleum jelly and I read how bad that was for your skin, so I worked on a better alternative.” She says Elbow Grease remains one of her best selling products, sharing the spotlight with the body butters she developed using shea butter. “Most of the products came about from people asking for different things,” says Dawn. “For example, a friend said the Elbow Grease wasn’t heavy enough for her because her skin was extremely dry. So I heard about shea butter and came up with body butters. The same thing happened when people said their feet were dry. Voila, foot butter!”

Balancing Business Ownership and Friendship

Dawn calls herself and Donna, April and Tricia the Pookalitas. “My mother called my sister and I her ‘Pookalitas’ when we were little,” says Dawn. “I know it was a term of endearment, but I still have no idea exactly what it means.” “We wanted to call the company Pookalita, but it was too long to fit on the label, so we just shortened it to Pooka! Pure and simple were just what we thought the products were – pure and simple,” she adds.

While many business owners work on balancing business ownership and family, the Pookalitas work on balancing business ownership and friendship. “We get to spend a lot of time together so we have a lot of fun, but sometimes we can annoy each other,” says Dawn. Balancing the friendship can have bad moments as well as good moments, but Dawn says, “we’re friends for life and we know that, so it rolls right off! Also, we pray a lot together and that keeps us focused.”

Dawn says that each of the Pookalitas has her own individual gifts, so each has a specific place in the business, from sales to finance. All the Pookalitas have invested everything in the business, including the money that helped them get started, because they didn’t have any start up capital or loans. Cash flow crunches still exist and the prayers and the friendship and support they give each other help them make it through the rough spots. “I work seven days a week, all day and night,” says Dawn, “but it’s worth it.” The customer responses they get keep them pumped, as do plans for the future. “We would love to have a Pooka Day Spa” says Dawn, “but at the moment we’re focusing on conquering Whole Foods one store at a time and growing our customer base.”

Expanding the Brand

Like many IBN members, the Pookalitas launched their venture with great ideas, but not much long term planning. Now that the brand seems to have taken hold with Whole Foods, they are going full bore with brand expansion plans. In addition to online and wholesale sales, they are using Pooka Parties to increase brand awareness. “Customers kept saying that we should come over to their house to sell Pooka,” says Dawn. “So we assembled some games and prizes, brought over the products and had a great time,” says Dawn. “From there we started booking more parties. They’re run just like any other home party that sells kitchen products or candles. The guests really enjoy learning about natural ingredients and the parties have been very successful,” says Dawn.

They are also using sales reps around the country to increase their customer base. But like most companies using that business model, Dawn is encountering her share of challenges. “We put the sales rep plan together because so many people told us they would love to sell Pooka products. After a while we decided to give them a shot.” Rather than reinvent the wheel, Dawn conducted research on other companies using the sales rep model. She assembled a smaller scale version of those programs and sent it out to some people to give it a test drive. “I didn't wait until it was perfect,” says Dawn. “I let them start with what I had, which had a lot of holes, and then allowed them to help me build the program by telling me what worked and what didn't,” says Dawn. “The reps have given us so much support and we have personal relationships with several of them,” she says.

It’s a lot of work, but Dawn is focused on the payoff. “Pooka Pure and Simple is based in East Orange, New Jersey, but the reps are all over,” says Dawn. They are concentrated in New Jersey, but with 60 reps and growing, you can find Pooka reps in California, the Carolinas, Illinois and other states, and they are expanding. “Down the road, I can see offering our first reps a limited time only management opportunity as Pooka grows,” says Dawn.

Working with dozens of people around the country has its challenges. In a word, says Dawn, “It's a MONSTER!!! It’s hard to keep reps motivated because our products don't change as fast as larger competitors’ products do. As a result, when their customers are satisfied with what they have, they don’t order for a while because we do not introduce new products at the rate that larger companies do.” Overworked maybe, but Dawn is not discouraged. “I try to create rep specials once a month. It could be a new product or sale items that are made available only to Pooka reps. This allows them to go back to that customer with a little something new each month.

Pooka’s 3-prong approach – sales reps and parties, online retail and wholesale – is exhausting. Says Dawn, “Many days I feel like we should just pick one and focus, but I never know which one. The reps is a great because we can reach so many people using a personal touch,” she says. Her advice is to, “Research how the larger companies do it and start with a family member or a friend who will help you get rid of the kinks as you go along. We set up our reps with PayPal accounts, which we use to pay them each month. At the end of the year, we send them 1099's. Dawn knows that many companies struggle with motivating sales reps. “We're working on the motivational part now, thinking of maybe bringing in a coach to do calls for the reps once a month to help reps stay focused and inspired.”

Dawn is also very excited about Pooka’s first celebrity endorsement from LaChanze, the star of the Broadway play “The Color Purple.” Dawn says LaChanze named Pooka as one of her favorite things in “More Magazine,” “Child,” and in the upcoming “Glamour” magazine.

Perseverance!

Dawn and the other Pookalitas use each other as support, and since they can spread the work among four committed business partners, there’s less work for each individual and this helps keep burnout at bay. Still Dawn says she has her days. Like all of us in IBN, Dawn has seen her share of handmade beauty business launch with fervor and then fizzle out once the owner sees that selling products for a living is very different from making them for a hobby. “I would tell anyone in the handmade beauty products business that what they need more than anything else is perseverance,” says Dawn. She admits that there are times when her workday ends with a determination never to come to work again. But then Dawn says, “Something wonderful happens, like a call from Whole Foods or some press, and then I’ll say ‘Okay. Two more weeks, but that’s it!’ But look at me now – I’m still here,” she says.

Dawn’s chief word of advice is to look to family and friends for help. “Pooka is where it is today because family and friends were always there to lend a hand, make a body butter, host a party and more. They are a blessing! And if you’re a prayerful person, do like we do: pray a lot because it helps you get through the dark times!”

IBN a Pooka Staple

“The Handmade Beauty Network is awesome! It’s been such a resource of information and when you’re trying to start your business, finding information can be hard,” says Dawn. “IBN is a staple and it’s funny Donna Maria’s book “Making Aromatherapy Creams and Lotions” was the first book I read when trying to create the Pooka line. I keep it on my shelf. It’s my natural products Bible.” “Donna Maria is wonderful. She’s always there to help,” says Dawn. “IF I email her for certain things I need, she gets right back to me.”

Exciting things are happening for the Pookalitas and their company, Pooka Pure and Simple. Check them out online or at the local Whole Foods stores in your area for the distinctive-looking Pooka products!

Please visit our Task Force link for other updates, and stay tuned for an in-depth look at the issue in the upcoming issue of the Handmade Beauty Business Magazine.

IBN Member Task Force State Leaders

District of Columbia: dM
Georgia: Ellie Trinowski of Moonshine Soap
Maryland: dM
Massachusetts: Renee Deal of Deal Farm Soap Co.
Missouri: Barbara Freeman of Soapers Market
Texas: Susan Soros of Soap Goddess Handmade Soap Co

If you wish to contribute to this important effort by becoming an IBN member Task Force Leader in your state, please contact me for details.

Also, IBN is assembling an online database of brokers around the nation. If a broker in your state has been able to provide you with affordable products liability insurance and you wish to tell other IBN members about it, please email me the broker's name and contact details so they can be added. Once this database is done, it will be uploaded and members will be able to search for brokers by state and area of specialty!

Best & Success!!
Donna Maria
Editor, The Handmade Beauty Connection
The Indie Beauty Network | www.handmadebeauty.com

Copyright (c) 2000 - 2006 by The Indie Beauty Network (IBN) and Donna Maria. All Rights Reserved. Unauthorized distribution or reproduction is prohibited. IBN does not necessarily endorse any product, event or ideology featured in The Handmade Beauty Connection (HBC) or on IBN's website. All information is provided on an "as is" basis and no express or implied warranties are given. Any use of the information contained in the HBC or on IBN's web site, including recipes, is solely at your own risk. IBN and Donna Maria disclaim any liability in connection with the use of all recipes, products reviewed and other information. Except for sponsorships, HBC refuses compensation from companies to feature or mention their names or products. Opinions expressed in any Product Review are personally those of the reviewer and do not represent the views of IBN, Donna Maria (unless she is the reviewer) or any other person or company.