Our Story
Hi! I'm Joanne from Joanne's Bath & Body. I love saying that!!! Here's my story...
In 2016, my husband TJ was diagnosed with Stage 4 Squamous Cell cancer. It had spread to his lymph nodes and he underwent both chemotherapy and radiation therapy. We went every day to radiation therapy for 7 weeks, and after a very short time, his skin was burned from chin to chest, but we still had to keep the area clean before and after treatment. Even water would sting and burn him, using the soap we had on hand was making things worse.
At one of TJ's treatments, I was outside with the radiation tech talking about how painful it was for him to keep the area clean. The tech asked which soap we were using and asked if we had tried a natural soap. We hadn't so I started looking into it.
I found a few natural soap makers online, and a couple of them had videos on YouTube. I started ordering from a couple of these soap makers, but by then I was quite intrigued with the whole process. I kept watching more and more makers and pretty soon, the urge to create took over!
Some time passed, and TJ went into remission. We were both in love with natural soap, and as much as we liked our old soap, we were totally converted! I had a couple batches of cold process soap under my belt and was enjoying this new hobby.
In early 2017, we woke up one morning to find our house was flooded! The whole first floor was ruined!!! We have a fantastic insurance company, and they treated us very well. Because of the stress, TJ's health took a backwards turn. Our insurance adjuster made it a priority to keep him as healthy and stress-free as we could, and helped make the entire insurance experience as painless as possible. We were moved into a rental house in our neighborhood and repairs/renovations commenced. I was still working for a major corporation, but from my home office. One afternoon, TJ came into my office and took a look around. I had a few bookcases in there, but none of them contained any books!!! He sat down and said "Sweetheart, you make good soap and I really like to use it! But you have a couple hundred bars curing in here! We're never going to use all of this! You should think about making and selling it!"
And that's how Joanne's Bath & Body got it's start!
Since that time, I've learned so much about the properties of the oils and butters I use, and the best way to use them to benefit and encourage healthy, happy skin and hair. I have expanded from just making soap to lotions, shampoo, balms, bath bombs, lip balm, body butter and even room spray and candles. I test every formula myself first, then pass it along to my next round of testers when I think its ready for others. After the second round of testing, I either make tweaks and edits, or, if everyone is happy, I get the product ready for sale.
Making these products appeals to both sides of my brain :) I've always been a crafty, creative person, and I've always been intrigued with how things are made, the math, chemistry, science of things. Making my products takes all of these things and more!
I have big hopes and dreams for Joanne's Bath & Body! Stick around a while, join my YouTube channel, like me on Instagram, follow me on FaceBook, and sign up for my monthly news letter! That way you can keep track of us every step of the way!