Investor Happy Hour 6-17 transcript
Hi everybody, we're gonna give everybody a little bit more time to join. So give us a couple minutes to get started. I was wondering if we need to hum the music video, right. So I think when you guys all came in, immediately went on mute. And it's up to you, if you want to go ahead and turn your audio on or share your camera or not. We weren't sure what people were going to want to do. We're all just very casual. So totally up to you hope you came as you are. And thank you very much for coming. We are going to like Kelly said, we're gonna wait a couple more minutes to see if more people join in. We did have quite a few more people than this register. So hopefully, we'll get a few more people actually showing up.
Hi, Michelle. Hi, Joanna. Hi, Carol and Lindsey and Diana. Hi, Kelly. I like seeing all your faces. Happy anniversary, you guys. A little crazy. Yes. Mistakes were made. not gonna get any easier. I do like these steps. What do you think, Christy Should we start or wait a little bit more,
I would say go ahead and start. We're already at 533. So people can hop in and catch up as we go. Perfect.
Hi, everybody. I am Kelly Perkins. And I'm the founder of Spinster Sisters. And we are gonna leave everybody kind of on mute. But I do love seeing your faces. And if you have questions kind of throughout this whole thing, if you can just put them in chat. We can, we're gonna kind of introduce the team, and everybody's gonna do a little talk about what their responsibility is at Spinster Sisters, and then we'll do q&a at the end. And then after that, if anybody wants to hang out and finish your cocktail, then you're welcome to do that as well. And we can unmute everybody. But like I said, if you have any questions, put them in chat. And we'll answer those at the end. If you have any questions specifically about Republic, if you could ask those on the platform, and Christy has put in our chat, the link to our republic campaign. So there's a discussion board on the republic campaign where you can ask any specific questions and about Republic. If you have questions about the campaign itself and what we're raising funds for. We're happy to try to answer those questions today. And so I'm the founder of Spinster Sisters, I started this company nine years ago, as kind of a fun thing to do. On the side of my day job. I was a business analyst at a corporate travel agency and worked on computer programming most of the day and started doing this actually at Craig's suggestion on weekends doing craft fairs and things like that, and it just kind of took on a life of its own. Many of you have kind of seen it evolve over the years. So especially Jacqueline, who you're going to meet in a little bit was my first hire. So we Yeah, we started with farmers markets, craft fairs and things like that started doing wholesale. A couple of years ago, we kind of pivoted from working primarily with gift shops more to working with natural and mass grocery. And that's kind of where our growth really started. And we're working with some great suppliers now, like, I'm talking too much, so try to cut it off here, but we're gonna have a great partners now like Kroger and Whole Foods and HEB in Texas, Duluth trading company, and quite a lot of, you know, natural grocery like that, and having a great time, and we're growing quickly. And yeah, so if you have any questions, shoot them over. I brought to this party, some vino bear day from Portugal and a source and Portugal where we hope when we retire to spend a lot of time. So that's my drink of choice. Um, as far as my favorite product that Spinster Sisters makes, that's kind of a hard one for me. But I think my favorite product is the sore muscle rub just because it's the one that I worked the hardest on. And when it clicked, it clicked. And it's a great product. So I also have some exciting news before we go on to meeting the rest of the team. We found out too, I guess it was yesterday. But yesterday evening that our Face Serum, which is another one of my favorite products, and we have a new product coming out. That's also another one of my favorite products. Our Face Serum won the beauty Product of the Year for the Mindful Awards. So we are so excited about that. So with that, I'm going to introduce Mr. Sisters, Craig, some of you know my sugar buns. That's really is the chief technical officer and I'm gonna let him introduce himself.
Yeah. So yeah, my name is Craig Kelly's husband here. And by day, I'm a senior scientist at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory here in Golden by night and frequently on the weekends. You know, I'm the CTO for Spinster Sisters. My formal training is in chemistry. So that allows me to give kind of a high level overview and recommendations on things like natural product selection, ingredient selection, and my and process process equipment, that sort of thing, a little bit of industrial hygiene. And then my, you know, 20 plus years that enroll being immersed in the culture of sustainability and renewable energy there, let's let's me provide some guidance on things like packaging and you know, kind of the viewpoint from the researcher side of what what might be good for, you know, sustainability practices in the company. Right now, after camping for several days with super cracked heels. My favorite product is the hand and foot salve. I really like that stuff. I can't say shaving cream, because I think I'm going to get scolded for recommending this new product. But I if there was ever a shaving cream, I think that stuff would be. Right now my weapon of choice is a Colorado local IPA and a frosty NW mug.
Perfect. And then we're gonna jump to Elliot, who is one of my advisors and my lifeline. He's with the intertwine group and if you want to introduce yourself,
sure, happy to thanks for having me here. Elliot Begoun, I'm with TIG intertwine group, what we do is come alongside amazing founders and brands in the emerging natural product space that we feel have the ability to really accelerate and grow and who are trying to change the way things are being done. So when I first came across Kelley and Spinster Sisters, I was blown away. In fact, it was Kelly pitching at a hershberg entrepreneurship Institute. And I thought like wow, this this, this is the founder who's been pitching, you know, hundreds and hundreds of times. She's got this down. It's like, you know, a cakewalk for so I reached out to her afterwards and she said that was my first pitch ever. But it's you know, we come alongside brands we believe in we, I am an investor. So I mean, I'm also, you know, put put, put that there. And that's part of the way we work with our brands that we believe in. And, you know, we are here to support the founders and the teams in navigating what can be really difficult in building a CPG brand to try to make sure that the brands are being as nimble, capital efficient and resilient as they need to be in order to have the opportunities to really reap the benefits of what they've created. So I'll leave you with two stats, and then I'll tell you what I'm drinking. Two stats are this in since 2009 to 2019 $18 billion in market share have moved from the top CPG companies to emerging brands like like, Spinster Sisters, and Kelly, huge amount of consumers want to buy products from people they feel like they know, and from products that are transparent and trust based. The other is that the vast majority of the founders and the brands that started in this space don't last more than two years 80 to 90%. Spinster Sisters has already been here over nine. So pretty cool stuff happening. now what I'm drinking. So one of the other founders that we support, and no, I met at a pitch event two and a half years ago in Montreal, and he creates really brilliant craft beers. This is a IPA that is not alcoholic and only 10 calories. Wow, whoa. And really good partake. So that's what I'm drinking. And the reason Kelly had me introduce myself first is not because my ego necessitated that or I asked is that I actually have to jump off to a to another call shortly. And just wanted to make sure to say hi before I did.
we're so thankful for Elliott's help with his he's just helped us so much. And you know, really being able to focus on the big picture and make the right moves. So we're very thankful for her support. I'm Aaron. I will let Aaron introduce himself now.
Hey, guys, my name is Aaron. I am the Director of Business Development with Spinster Sisters. And I came on about 18 months ago kind of coinciding with Kelly's pivot towards more the traditional kind of natural products CPG space after her highly successful phase and the gift to boutique shop channel. So kind of coincided with that pivot and her business is when I came on, and it's been super exciting and you know, never a dull moment ever since. And I've actually had a relationship with the brand even before that my wife worked off and on in a variety of capacities with Spinster Sisters at the boutique shop down in Golden in the production facility did some social media marketing work back in the day. So yeah, I've I've known Kelly and then the Spinster Sisters brand for for four or five years now, which has been really exciting. And yeah, I have about 10 years of experience in the CPG space, kind of in a variety of roles, everything from stocking shelves at Whole Foods back in the day, like 10 years ago to, you know, brand ambassador ships with a number of different national brands. I was the director of operations at a co packing facility at one point, the National Sales Director for a food brand in Boulder immediately before joining the spinsters team. So yeah, just kind of seen it from a bunch of different angles, which has been really fun. And one of the reasons I mean, I can name multiple reasons why I love Spinster Sisters, but I think one of the biggest things that that I think about, and I think Elliott alluded to it is, you know, the grit and determination of Kelly as, as a founder in this industry, you know, you're around for nine years doing this. And, you know, the the fact that she's here and not only here but thriving and growing and we're doing we're doing stuff, you know, and we're doing it, we're doing it differently, and that means it's harder, you know, so, you know, we're trying to do things differently. We're trying to, you know, kind of our mission, you know, doing better for people and the planet. And that means we're not taking the shortcuts, we're doing things a little, a little more intentionally, which I think is important to note. So that's really important for me, as somebody that is invested in the team not only with money but also just you know being being a part of You know the day to day operations. My favorite product. Before I tell you what I'm drinking is our face cream. By far, I think just the formulation on that Kelly did a tremendous job of formulating that product. Especially for the dry, arid climate of the Mountain West. It's really light, but I love how it feels. I use it every day. And I'm drinking a vodka soda today. So cheers.
Yeah, having Aaron joined the team was definitely business changing for us. He's been such an amazing asset for us, not just from a sales perspective, but from every angle. So we're really thankful that he's a part of the team. And next we have my friend Ellen, who's our general manager. lm, you want to introduce yourself? Why Sure.
I'm Ellen Sample. I am the general manager. So I'm responsible for production and shipping. Basically, all things operations and anything else. Kelly throws at me, hence the name General Manager. So I'm kind of a do everything, make sure things are made. Package sent out on time and just getting it done. I've known Kelly for 20 years now. I knew her from a previous time as our can adjust. And I just trust her judgment and business implicitly. There's I wouldn't have made the jump to leave a job. I had 18 years to come work with her if I didn't know her love her trust her. And know that she always lands on her feet. somehow, some way the girl gets. I feel like a cat dog licking cat. My favorite products face serum. Just because I've never seen an oil that goes on dry before in my life. doesn't leave you oily and for somehow some ways. It doesn't. My drink of choice is a bartending and might be a fail that I tried to be a mixologist. I looked really good. I opened the liquor cabinet. I was thinking vodka and I'm like, no, not vodka. So I threw some mount gay rum in it's a nice. It is. Looks like it has Campari in it. It's great fruit soda from nothing that we got. I always forget how tart grapefruit truly is. It sounds so good in theory.
Also in Ellen's purview, this is Kristen, you can't see me. Also, under Ellen's purview is master of fun. She makes everything fun. She's always the dancing Queen she she's, she's big face Ellen might be getting a pie in the face. And then you're learning you're getting now be pinhead Craig after this.
So yes, it took several years of begging for Elon to leave our old employer to come over with us. And I am thankful for her every day, especially the last two weeks when we have had purchase order after purchase order going out the door and she just doesn't get phased and get some out. So very thankful. And next we have Jacqueline, who, like I said was my first hire. And she started out in production in our basement back when this was really small. And now is in charge of our marketing efforts. So Jacqueline
hello. Um, yes, as Kelly said, I lead our creative team. And so just to give you an idea of what that consists of, we have a brand strategist, which is Kristen, who's on this call. Our social media coordinator Maggie here, we also have a graphic designer who's fabulous in house. And so my background was actually fine arts, got my BA and moved on to digital printing. So I was the production manager to digital print shop here in Denver. And starting to work at Spinster Sisters was actually a little bit of a pivot for me, because I was not thriving in production management. I wanted to do something more creative. And I was super attracted to Kelly's brand. When I saw Her job listing for her first full timer back in the days and seven years ago, she had a fantastic friend, I think a friend from high school, he said, his name's Andy Cruz, he works at PS studios. And he had put together her package her logo, a lot of the visual elements that really the visual language we still use today on our packaging. And it just drew me in. So I started working for Kelly, and was lucky enough to get to know the whole product line working in production and talking to customers and markets back when you know, it literally with that small team, everybody has to do everything even more so than when you're a team of 15. So
I feel like that was really valuable getting to talk to customers. And as soon as I could, though, I moved into web design, doing our packaging, design and leading our marketing because that's what I love. I love working in the CPG space. I think it's it's so exciting to get to take a product that, you know, it feels great, it's smells great, you know, but it's still without being in the package or going on a website, you know, what is it? People don't know. So you have to create, you know, this entire story around your product to make people know, just from seeing your product on a screen that you know, it's gonna be that incredibly amazing feeling body butter that you know, you know, it is, you know, it is so, which is actually my favorite product by the way. It's hard to I can't leave body butters it's it's I think it's been working in production because when I first started we were still doing some little tweaks to that formula to get that perfect feel. So yeah, every time a review rolls in on the website now where someone says like, Oh my gosh, body butter is because Jacqueline's tweaks that fixed it. Yeah, just like with your muscle stuff. But yeah, like when people say body butter is like, the only thing that's that's helping their cracked hands, it gives me a little more warm feeling inside. But yeah, I love that stuff is preserved with radish root. I mean, how cool is that? You have like, your parabens, and, you know, nasty stuff that can be in some lotion. So it's pretty cool. And yeah, so I'm super excited, though, to see what this raise can do for our marketing, because I see just so much potential. You know, I think we have a brand that, you know, honestly, like, when I look at a lot of brands on the shelf, I'm bored. Like, I think that a lot of new brands look the same. You know, when you look down the shelf, we really stand apart. And I think, you know, as we work more on our packaging, with actually Waven, who is here on this call from TIG, and I know some other consultants are giving us some great advice. I think we can really work on that differentiation and make it so that customers are truly understanding who we are and how we fit into their life. I'm super excited that we just got a new digital advertising partner triarc they've worked with hot tea, and re botanicals and are already doing great things. And I can't wait to see more growth there. You know, we're just starting on Facebook and Instagram, but there's a huge world out there that you can do with paid advertising. So yeah, it's pretty cool to see the traction and, and to see the company grow from, you know, Kelly's basement to, you know, walking down the aisle of Whole Foods. And my gosh, we have like, seven shelves or, you know, more shelf space than anybody else in some stores here in Denver. So, yeah, that's pretty cool. And what I’m drinking, Oh, that's right. I'm just drinking juice though funny last night. Yesterday was Jacqueline's birthday.
What a funny story about Jacqueline. Um, we were still having my friend Andy do kind of our graphic design at this point. And, and I came down with a bottle one day and I said to Jacqueline, I want to make a larger size of our body butter. So can you make this body butter fill it, you know, put the pump in and bring it back up. And I'm going to take a picture and then send it to Andy to make label and I came back upstairs to do QuickBooks or whatever thing I needed to do that day. And Jacqueline walks up about 45 minutes later and plops down a body butter on my desk with the label that she designed. That was absolutely stunning. And I went Hmm. Okay, there's hidden talent here. And I had no idea that was you know, that's the fun part about owning a business like this is you really when somebody comes into a position you really Have no idea, you know what their interest is and where their skills lie. And Jacqueline wanted this and she showed me she could do it if it was amazing. So I'm thankful for every single one of our hires. Jona's here, she actually was helping us in production as well. And just moved on to another position. But we love seeing you here, Jona. I can put Waven on the spot. I don't know Waven if you feel like introducing yourself or not.
Sure, I'll just make it really quick. I worked with Elliot and I help head up brand activation for all the brands that we work with in the TIG ohana. And I'm based in Hawaii. So I'm here taking care of my 85 year old dad, who's not in great health. So I'm working with our brands from Hawaii. We work with a lot of them for international and such. And I'm actually very delighted I'm working with Jacqueline and some of the packaging, as she mentioned, and just refining that. And it's beautiful product to start with the experience of it. The tangibility and I think as she mentioned the differentiation, I feel like she does. There's not many brands like this on the market in this category. So congrats.
Thank you. Thanks. Thanks for joining. You're welcome. So yeah, this is this is kind of our whole leadership team. As you can see, we're small and scrappy, and got a million things going on. from day to day. Did I get everybody? I got everybody did me. Um, so yeah, it's super fun. You know, I, when I started the business, it kind of came to a point fairly quickly, where I either had to choose to do my day job or choose to do Spinster Sisters. And let me tell you, one of my favorite things in the world is formulating products. And there was no decision there. You know, thankfully, I have a very supportive as let me take this leap. But it's been such an adventure and such a ride, and I have way more super fun days than I have not fun days. And that is something that not a lot of people can say. So with that said, um, do we have any Kristen? Do we have any questions we need answering?
Um there are a couple of burning questions. All right. First one that I saw was what's with all the Willy Wonka quotes in your core values.
We'd love Willy Wonka. I mean, the whole story is about opportunity and what you know, what you can make out of a world with what you're given. So, we're big fans of Willy Wonka. And let's, uh, they tell a great story. So how can you not want to be engaged in that?
love it love to hear it. Um, and I don't remember if this was in the chat, but I know that everybody wants to know every person I ever talked to you wants to know why Spinster Sisters as your company name.
Ah, yes. So my sister and I, and my family, you can't go give a gift unless you make it for Christmas. That's kind of been our rule for a while. So I had made I believe I was 25 at the time and my sister was 28. So we might have called it a little early. But I had made my first batch of soap. And she had made some Christmas ornaments and she came home one day we were living together and we always joked about being spinsters. She came home one day and said let's do this craft fair at my office and sell what we have leftover from Christmas. And I said, Well, we need a company name. And that made perfect sense to go with Spinster Sisters. So that's why we're Spinster Sisters. She did one craft fair and said, This is not for me. So she doesn't have anything to do with the company anymore. But when I you know fast forward a whole lot of years when I actually started the company full time. That was such a meaningful time in my life that it made perfect sense to me. I didn't have to think about it. I knew the company name was gonna be Spinster Sisters.
Well, that's really nice. But now it's obviously morphed into something entirely bigger than that. What does Spinster sisters mean now as a brand?
Well, you know, we have a really, really strong commitment to supporting women. We work closely with Girls Inc. In fact, we have a Girls Inc. intern. in our office right now we have at least one if not two, or three every summer. And we donate to them. We work with some women's shelters. So we're really kind of a company of women. We're also webnc certified woman owned business. So we're kind of a woman owned business supporting women. And so, again, the company name, I think, just fits.
But you know, I think it harkens back to a simpler time and reflects the need the market niche for simpler, transparent ingredients.
okay, cool. And we have a question from Carol Harwood. how committed to golden are you?
It's our home. So we're, we're committed to golden. We love it here. I grew up in Boulder, you know, just 20 miles north of here. And I just love it here. It's inspiring to me to be able to look out the windows and see the mountains and be able to go on hikes. And yeah, we're very committed to staying here. It's a great community for us. We've gotten unbelievable support since starting the business. And I would never want to walk away from that.
Yay. That's awesome. Hopefully, that satisfied you Carol as well. I thought that was fantastic answer. There's another question in here from Maggie. And I think she already knows the answer.. trouble. Can you tell us a story of how you first got into soap making it? I know, she knows the story, but it's a good one. So why don't you go ahead and share?
Yeah. Oh, and Myrtles here. Um, so yeah, so I read an article a very long time ago, in the 90s, about triclosan, which is a pretty toxic chemical that's in a lot of commercially produced skincare products. It's antibacterial, but it's a hormone inhibitor and linked to cancer and you know, just kind of a string of bad side effects. And so I kind of made the decision at that point that I didn't want to put these toxic chemicals on my skin anymore. And this was a long time ago. So it was before I even knew that Google existed, I believe. And so I wanted to learn how to make natural soap. And I hopped on my bike and rode, I was in Boulder at the time, hopped on my bike and rode down boulder bookstore and bought three books about how to make soap, and made my first batch of soap, which by some weird foresight I had I had the foresight, I guess I should say, to keep one bar of each of my first three batches of soap. So I still to this day, have one bar, which I wish I brought so you can see it. It's the saddest little thing you've ever seen before, but a logo, but I got absolutely addicted to making soap you don't think it's the case, but it's a really creative process. And it's I didn't think at the time that I had a creative bone in my body. And it's just fun. I got totally hooked on the process. Barb can attest to this, because she's also soapmaker now but yeah, it’s been a great adventure.
Very cool. Um, so yeah, Diana had a question too. Will you continue to make your bath salts, please? All caps.
It's funny, because we've been having conversations about that. You know, when we at one point, we had four retail stores of our own, and you need a lot of products to fill a retail store. So we made everything and we tried to make everything you know, we make too many things. So now we're trying to kind of rein things in to you know, really focus on what moves well for us and become more efficient. So that's one of the products that we've been thinking about. I can't say one way or the other yet, but it seems like when we started making bath bombs and shower steamers, and they really kind of took off, you know, more of the single use products. So I can't say for sure, but right after shaving We'll have something like that. I can't say it's gonna be in the same exact form, but okay.
Um, let's see. Does anyone want to unmute and ask a question verbally? Or just say hi everybody? Yeah, now's a good time. Everybody done mute. Let's have some drinks starting after six. Let's go ahead and even more casual. Um, so let's see what other questions often come up. You might have already touched on this, I don't recall what was the very first scent of soap that you ever made?
lavender, lavender, lavender, then my mom asked for Eucalyptus, then I thought I tried to get fancy and make a bar with coffee in it. But I put way too much coffee of it and it just crumbled. So there’s been successes there’s been failures. But, you know, we, we have a really strong mission to use absolutely clean plant based ingredients. And, and that, you know, our environmental impact and using those clean ingredients is is considered in every move that we make. And it's interesting, because I don't know if anybody saw this, but there was I don't even know how to say the word Craig probably well, but there's been studies published recently about PFA s. You know what that is? Yeah,
forever chemicals, they're referred to just don't get degraded. Yeah, environment,
and there's a lot in makeup. Mm hmm. You know, so it's, it's scary to me to think about that. And, and like Craig said, you know, our name and our mission kind of does harken back to ingredients, plant based ingredients that have been around for years. And, and, you know, are safe to use and, and tried and true over the years. So whenever I see a study like that come out, it's I'm so thankful that we're really thoughtful about what we make and what we do.
Kelly, are you referencing the one just came out two days ago? Yeah. Okay, fantastic.
I love that. Yeah. So the thing is, how long it takes for things to get banned, like, triclosan saying that, you know, you said back in the 90s, you started making soap to avoid using triclosan and doesn't get banned and sold 2016 Well, that's been banned for years.
So it's, I mean, the plant thing is interesting, too, because from a chemical standpoint, you know, you can end up with the same starting chemical from either plants or say petrochemical sources and and end up with the same starting material. But there was just I just read an article this Few days ago, and chemical and engineering news, which is the magazine for the American Chemical Society where they discovered a whole bunch of in some consumer products, cosmetics, traces of benzene, which is a known carcinogen. They don't really know how it got there. But the suspicion is that is just a little bit of a trace contaminant. It that ultimately comes from the petrochemical side. So even though you might, you know, there's an advantage to using the plant sourcing, I guess, almost always,
eah. Um Kelly, one of the questions on here that wasn't answered that I'm curious about is what machinery Do you plan to purchase to help with the production at the Microsoapery?
Yeah, so we, we do a lot of our production still largely by hand. And I think that there are a lot of pieces of equipment, you know, certainly I would love to have bottling lines and things like that, that, you know, you put in the body butter that's made and it spits out a packaged batch coded expiration date coded product. And those are extremely pricey, but there's equipment that we can buy right now, that and lease that will, you know, probably triple our production capacity. So they with the same amount of people. So it's, you know, it's it's filling machines, it's a there is a tube, tube filler and sealer machine that I want to get. It's more batch coating equipment, things like that. Okay. Sounds good. Thanks. Yeah. Diana, where are you located?
Diana where are you located? I'm in Westminster yes and I’ve been shopping at the store when I first discovered you I believe it was about five years ago which is why I want your bath salts. Noted, it’s noted. Thank you I tend to take a bath with you I sent it I think it was 2 years ago I took some of my jars to be refilled and there And there are rapidly working trying to make a funnel out of a piece of paper to fill it so the next time I went to get refills I'm the one that brought you the the blue funnel funny but yes I've been using the the face serum and the face cream I mean when I quit working retail after 35 years in 1994 I thought I'm never wearing makeup again I never wear heels and I'm not putting a bra unless I have to go to a wedding or funeral. But that face cream is absolutely phenomenal my skin is very sensitive so I was always really conscientious about what I put on in the morning and once I discovered your face cream then I went to the face serum and people when they ask my age and I tell them they're like there's no way and it’s like yes way I am and it’s all because of Spinster Sisters so I sell your products by word of mouth. Oh thank you that’s awesome that’s cool.
Yay and I wanna thank my husband for my birthday gift which is investing in your company. Oh thank you and to your husband too. I’ll let him know. He looks at the counter and he says well they’re all there I own more of them anyway I might as well make some money at it. I have sold so much of your hand sanitizers When we go out to restaurants and I'll come back from going to the bathroom and I'm sure it's in my hand and servers will you know the ladies in particular and I spritz their hands and where can I get those so you're currently in King Soopers on 104th Ave where I live and I tell him about the store and golden and I'm in. Oh nice you’re making us both money. I’m your public relations manager. I love it.
Jona what do you have to add? Is there anything you wanna add? Um I reckon this thing I’ve had this for more than two years I bought it at your store and I hadn’t even started working with you at that time. Oh my gosh how funny that’s awesome good job. I bought two of them and when I started working with you and when you said you weren’t going to make this anymore I froze my second one because I didn’t want it to get spoiled. This is my second one and it’s about to finish but um I really like it. Um my entire family loves the products my mom’s favorite product is the face cream my daughter pomegranate soap my husband uh muscle stuff obviously. Um mine is I love your body lotion bar because I love signature scent woohoo I love body lotion bar too yes so
One of the best little gifts when somebody does something nice for me you know I’d like to thank them I give them your lavender soap bar. And they love it just love it everybody loves lavender it’s so calming and reflective. That’s terrific thank you You are more than welcome.
Can everybody say their favorite scent? Lavender On the count of three lavender patchouli patchouli rosemary mint lemongrass yeah lemongrass sage timber yeah timber timber’s a good one timber. It’s funny my favorite is Ellen’s least favorite she hates it. It’s true I’ve got the sinus nasal appeal of a 12 year old girl Kelly’s is a little more mature.
I also really love the face cleanser scent I just love that yeah. I have been using the face cleanser and what we concocted before I left and the face cleanser and I’m loving it. Oh good yeah. So it’s working. Yeah we actually have a new product coming out thanks to Jona that’s what I was alluding to I absolutely love it so stay tuned, we just gotta get packaging figured out for it but it’s pretty terrific but it’s another face care product that oh good is gonna be fun.
So what do you think about this call was it helpful was it informative is there topics you would like us to cover in future calls? Fora first call it was extremely informative and everybody was allowed to how they came in to the company which I think is great cuz it's always nice to know what you're investing in and after this call, I’m going to tell my husband let's see Christmas is coming up oh there’s the 4th of July can we invest some more please? I’m completely sold. I mean it’s you’re already all over my body you might as well be in my bank account. Ohhhh oh my god I’m gonna use that as quote diana. A public tee? I think we need a investor tee our investor tees should say I’m on your body now I’m in your bank account. Yes we are using that somehow.
I will say that everybody every employee on this screen every one of our employees period is an investor in the company so I think that that’s a good you know certainly some more than others but I think that’s a great motivation for people as well. But is there other things that yall would like to see? I’m going to have to pop off guys thanks thanks Aaron thank you so much cheers have a nice night cheers investors thank you for investing everyone yeah that means a lot yeah talk to you all soon next call bye Aaron perfect. Yeah so if you have any suggestions we do want to have more of these calls in the future and I'm not kicking anybody else you can stay as long as you want cuz I still have more wine to drink if you have suggestions on what we can talk about in future calls this is our first time really doing this but we kind of want to get on a regular schedule of of doing these. So Kelly I have a question. Uh huh?
Is there a deadline is there a round two or how does this thing with Republic work? So the Republic campaign I think it 78 more days that we're live on Republic and so that will be round 1 and there's a possibility that there will be a round 2 it just kind of depends how much efficiencies and you know the digital marketing spend a lot of a lot of this round is going to go towards marketing spend to try that really kind of blow the roof off of our digital marketing and direct-to-consumer sales so it kind of depends on how All that goes but we haven't really you know we've kind of grown digitally organically just you know we've done some Facebook ads and things like that but we don't really do Google ads or anything like that so we're trying to invest in that to really help kind of row our direct-to-consumer sales so I kind of I imagine there will be another round at some point but I'm not sure when that will be.
I do want to tell you that one of the reasons that um we did decide to invest well he decided with me pushing him is we had our financial advisor look into your company and especially your website and your website he was particularly impressed so that's a very big plus for you. Oh that’s Jacquelyn well and Kristen does a lot of work on our website too that’s terrific thank you that’s great feedback. That was a big factor in our decision to invest other than the fact that I look young. I love it. Is this is this going is this. Thank you I just turned 71 Sunday. Oh wow seriously I would not have guess that yay Spinster Sisters. Happy birthday to you.
Um Kelly is all this meeting your expectations or how is that going?Yeah it’s great um you know we’ve never done anything like this before so I didn't really come into it with a lot of expectations but we've got some great engagement from it and even people that don't invest it you know makes them more familiar with our company and it gets them shopping on our website and and things like that so there really is no lose to this it's all win you know regardless of the outcome.
It was extremely informative to me as a new investor so I really appreciate the time you took to do this. Great cool yeah and now we have great brand ambassadors out there too. I mean I’m a big part of the investment pieces you know y'all own a piece of it now so talk it up
So the Kroger thing Is that potentially going to kind of expand to the whole Kroger brand or how how does that happen?
That's what we're working on right now one advantage that we have is that we’re women owned and you know they Kroger has a very big you know kind of minority women-owned business focus diversity focus and our products have been flying off the shelves at King Soopers so we have really good sales data on it so we actually had to call with a Kroger rep about a week and a half ago to start the process of trying to expand into other Kroger footprint like Fred Meyer and you know some of those.
What my sister who lives in Santa Rosa when I was telling her when she called to wish me happy birthday last Sunday about how Steve had invested in your company for me and so I was describing the product and how much I liked it and she looked it up and you're in a bookstore in Santa Rosa California oh yeah and she said I'm going there tomorrow and she did and she said I tried to take the face cream like you suggested she loved it absolutely loved it oh terrific. And I love that you're at King Soopers too because when I run out of the hand sanitizer I go right down the street and I can stock up and the calming spray for your bed clothing my oh yeah the room and body spray yeah. When we do Saturday day trips and what not and we're going to Glenwood Springs tomorrow for the non Strawberry Festival and you know that always that goes with me and then we went to Estes Park for anniversary in March that went with me and yeah what after a day of walking and you know all of that when you just get back to your room you just spritz and your calm. Yeah I love it too that’s great. Yeah yeah.
Well like I said I'm your new public relations manager I love it just by Word of Mouth and watch out Diana because I have your eemail now and so you might be hearing from me. Oh we have to do our drawing.
Yes oh that’s right gonna do a drawing with the folks that are here gonna do a quick little drawing sadly some people have left and you have to be present to win cuz you got to pick your scent this I am going with ah Carol Harwood you’re gonna win a we call it the Sisters Starter Set We're actually in the process of changing the name for it but for now it's called Sister's starters that and it comes in several different scents so you just so we have lavender lemongrass oatmeal and pomegranate you can choose from lemongrass I have biting bugs so Yahoo can you drop your address in the chat so we can get it shipped off to you I'll come pick it up cuz I'm local I love the fact that you have stayed local I want to stay local cover cover cover companies that have been so successful I have seen you grow from you know itty bitty to stores and you move to different locations and I just got to tell you I'm all about supporting people who value things and who are sustainable and I just love what you've done and I love your products because here's the deal I’m a knitter and I can put on your lotions and I can knit without being greasy. That’s true nice there’s another quote I love it the marketing folks are all taking notes right now You aren’t the one that did you write a review about how the body butter got rid of your velcro hands for knitting yes exactly you know when you knit I'm we’re talking about yeah and I can’t do it with greasy hands and I have to be able to knit and move on so yes perfect and I love fantastic I just love the local connection I'm a golden girl. Oh nice.
I like what she's saying about you know you put it on your able to buy hand paint pottery for living and sell it across shows when there used to be crab shows slowly coming back but you know in between washing my hands and then putting the lotion on I can go right back to painting and not have to brush slip out of my hand you know lose my place when I'm you know doing a direct line or whatever oh that’s terrific. Paints in the background here that’s true yeah it looks a little bit like our downstairs. And I’m on Etsy now look for only for you by Diana no breaks in between. Alright we’ll look for it.
I appreciate everybody joining so much and we love having you as part of the team and a few haven’t invested we would love you love to have you join the team but I just really appreciate you taking the time and it was great to see everybody so
Thank you for introducing us to our new company great yes I love it. Yes. Lindsay just said bye in chat oh missed her she didn’t she didn’t chime in at all but she did say bye at the very end there so good. Perfect.
Everybody's going to I'm going to follow up with everybody on email and then if you enjoyed this hopefully you will share with your friends and family and let them know we're going to be doing this again and then if you have any more ideas for a screw things that we can do in future rooms to make them better or just make them fun or any ideas at all please let us know you can reply to the email or just reach out to us anytime
Great thank you thank you all very much thank you it was great to see everybody thanks a lot bye everybody bye bye thanks for coming thanks for investing bye bye cheers
More thanks and goodbyes.
Hi, Michelle. Hi, Joanna. Hi, Carol and Lindsey and Diana. Hi, Kelly. I like seeing all your faces. Happy anniversary, you guys. A little crazy. Yes. Mistakes were made. not gonna get any easier. I do like these steps. What do you think, Christy Should we start or wait a little bit more,
I would say go ahead and start. We're already at 533. So people can hop in and catch up as we go. Perfect.
Hi, everybody. I am Kelly Perkins. And I'm the founder of Spinster Sisters. And we are gonna leave everybody kind of on mute. But I do love seeing your faces. And if you have questions kind of throughout this whole thing, if you can just put them in chat. We can, we're gonna kind of introduce the team, and everybody's gonna do a little talk about what their responsibility is at Spinster Sisters, and then we'll do q&a at the end. And then after that, if anybody wants to hang out and finish your cocktail, then you're welcome to do that as well. And we can unmute everybody. But like I said, if you have any questions, put them in chat. And we'll answer those at the end. If you have any questions specifically about Republic, if you could ask those on the platform, and Christy has put in our chat, the link to our republic campaign. So there's a discussion board on the republic campaign where you can ask any specific questions and about Republic. If you have questions about the campaign itself and what we're raising funds for. We're happy to try to answer those questions today. And so I'm the founder of Spinster Sisters, I started this company nine years ago, as kind of a fun thing to do. On the side of my day job. I was a business analyst at a corporate travel agency and worked on computer programming most of the day and started doing this actually at Craig's suggestion on weekends doing craft fairs and things like that, and it just kind of took on a life of its own. Many of you have kind of seen it evolve over the years. So especially Jacqueline, who you're going to meet in a little bit was my first hire. So we Yeah, we started with farmers markets, craft fairs and things like that started doing wholesale. A couple of years ago, we kind of pivoted from working primarily with gift shops more to working with natural and mass grocery. And that's kind of where our growth really started. And we're working with some great suppliers now, like, I'm talking too much, so try to cut it off here, but we're gonna have a great partners now like Kroger and Whole Foods and HEB in Texas, Duluth trading company, and quite a lot of, you know, natural grocery like that, and having a great time, and we're growing quickly. And yeah, so if you have any questions, shoot them over. I brought to this party, some vino bear day from Portugal and a source and Portugal where we hope when we retire to spend a lot of time. So that's my drink of choice. Um, as far as my favorite product that Spinster Sisters makes, that's kind of a hard one for me. But I think my favorite product is the sore muscle rub just because it's the one that I worked the hardest on. And when it clicked, it clicked. And it's a great product. So I also have some exciting news before we go on to meeting the rest of the team. We found out too, I guess it was yesterday. But yesterday evening that our Face Serum, which is another one of my favorite products, and we have a new product coming out. That's also another one of my favorite products. Our Face Serum won the beauty Product of the Year for the Mindful Awards. So we are so excited about that. So with that, I'm going to introduce Mr. Sisters, Craig, some of you know my sugar buns. That's really is the chief technical officer and I'm gonna let him introduce himself.
Yeah. So yeah, my name is Craig Kelly's husband here. And by day, I'm a senior scientist at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory here in Golden by night and frequently on the weekends. You know, I'm the CTO for Spinster Sisters. My formal training is in chemistry. So that allows me to give kind of a high level overview and recommendations on things like natural product selection, ingredient selection, and my and process process equipment, that sort of thing, a little bit of industrial hygiene. And then my, you know, 20 plus years that enroll being immersed in the culture of sustainability and renewable energy there, let's let's me provide some guidance on things like packaging and you know, kind of the viewpoint from the researcher side of what what might be good for, you know, sustainability practices in the company. Right now, after camping for several days with super cracked heels. My favorite product is the hand and foot salve. I really like that stuff. I can't say shaving cream, because I think I'm going to get scolded for recommending this new product. But I if there was ever a shaving cream, I think that stuff would be. Right now my weapon of choice is a Colorado local IPA and a frosty NW mug.
Perfect. And then we're gonna jump to Elliot, who is one of my advisors and my lifeline. He's with the intertwine group and if you want to introduce yourself,
sure, happy to thanks for having me here. Elliot Begoun, I'm with TIG intertwine group, what we do is come alongside amazing founders and brands in the emerging natural product space that we feel have the ability to really accelerate and grow and who are trying to change the way things are being done. So when I first came across Kelley and Spinster Sisters, I was blown away. In fact, it was Kelly pitching at a hershberg entrepreneurship Institute. And I thought like wow, this this, this is the founder who's been pitching, you know, hundreds and hundreds of times. She's got this down. It's like, you know, a cakewalk for so I reached out to her afterwards and she said that was my first pitch ever. But it's you know, we come alongside brands we believe in we, I am an investor. So I mean, I'm also, you know, put put, put that there. And that's part of the way we work with our brands that we believe in. And, you know, we are here to support the founders and the teams in navigating what can be really difficult in building a CPG brand to try to make sure that the brands are being as nimble, capital efficient and resilient as they need to be in order to have the opportunities to really reap the benefits of what they've created. So I'll leave you with two stats, and then I'll tell you what I'm drinking. Two stats are this in since 2009 to 2019 $18 billion in market share have moved from the top CPG companies to emerging brands like like, Spinster Sisters, and Kelly, huge amount of consumers want to buy products from people they feel like they know, and from products that are transparent and trust based. The other is that the vast majority of the founders and the brands that started in this space don't last more than two years 80 to 90%. Spinster Sisters has already been here over nine. So pretty cool stuff happening. now what I'm drinking. So one of the other founders that we support, and no, I met at a pitch event two and a half years ago in Montreal, and he creates really brilliant craft beers. This is a IPA that is not alcoholic and only 10 calories. Wow, whoa. And really good partake. So that's what I'm drinking. And the reason Kelly had me introduce myself first is not because my ego necessitated that or I asked is that I actually have to jump off to a to another call shortly. And just wanted to make sure to say hi before I did.
we're so thankful for Elliott's help with his he's just helped us so much. And you know, really being able to focus on the big picture and make the right moves. So we're very thankful for her support. I'm Aaron. I will let Aaron introduce himself now.
Hey, guys, my name is Aaron. I am the Director of Business Development with Spinster Sisters. And I came on about 18 months ago kind of coinciding with Kelly's pivot towards more the traditional kind of natural products CPG space after her highly successful phase and the gift to boutique shop channel. So kind of coincided with that pivot and her business is when I came on, and it's been super exciting and you know, never a dull moment ever since. And I've actually had a relationship with the brand even before that my wife worked off and on in a variety of capacities with Spinster Sisters at the boutique shop down in Golden in the production facility did some social media marketing work back in the day. So yeah, I've I've known Kelly and then the Spinster Sisters brand for for four or five years now, which has been really exciting. And yeah, I have about 10 years of experience in the CPG space, kind of in a variety of roles, everything from stocking shelves at Whole Foods back in the day, like 10 years ago to, you know, brand ambassador ships with a number of different national brands. I was the director of operations at a co packing facility at one point, the National Sales Director for a food brand in Boulder immediately before joining the spinsters team. So yeah, just kind of seen it from a bunch of different angles, which has been really fun. And one of the reasons I mean, I can name multiple reasons why I love Spinster Sisters, but I think one of the biggest things that that I think about, and I think Elliott alluded to it is, you know, the grit and determination of Kelly as, as a founder in this industry, you know, you're around for nine years doing this. And, you know, the the fact that she's here and not only here but thriving and growing and we're doing we're doing stuff, you know, and we're doing it, we're doing it differently, and that means it's harder, you know, so, you know, we're trying to do things differently. We're trying to, you know, kind of our mission, you know, doing better for people and the planet. And that means we're not taking the shortcuts, we're doing things a little, a little more intentionally, which I think is important to note. So that's really important for me, as somebody that is invested in the team not only with money but also just you know being being a part of You know the day to day operations. My favorite product. Before I tell you what I'm drinking is our face cream. By far, I think just the formulation on that Kelly did a tremendous job of formulating that product. Especially for the dry, arid climate of the Mountain West. It's really light, but I love how it feels. I use it every day. And I'm drinking a vodka soda today. So cheers.
Yeah, having Aaron joined the team was definitely business changing for us. He's been such an amazing asset for us, not just from a sales perspective, but from every angle. So we're really thankful that he's a part of the team. And next we have my friend Ellen, who's our general manager. lm, you want to introduce yourself? Why Sure.
I'm Ellen Sample. I am the general manager. So I'm responsible for production and shipping. Basically, all things operations and anything else. Kelly throws at me, hence the name General Manager. So I'm kind of a do everything, make sure things are made. Package sent out on time and just getting it done. I've known Kelly for 20 years now. I knew her from a previous time as our can adjust. And I just trust her judgment and business implicitly. There's I wouldn't have made the jump to leave a job. I had 18 years to come work with her if I didn't know her love her trust her. And know that she always lands on her feet. somehow, some way the girl gets. I feel like a cat dog licking cat. My favorite products face serum. Just because I've never seen an oil that goes on dry before in my life. doesn't leave you oily and for somehow some ways. It doesn't. My drink of choice is a bartending and might be a fail that I tried to be a mixologist. I looked really good. I opened the liquor cabinet. I was thinking vodka and I'm like, no, not vodka. So I threw some mount gay rum in it's a nice. It is. Looks like it has Campari in it. It's great fruit soda from nothing that we got. I always forget how tart grapefruit truly is. It sounds so good in theory.
Also in Ellen's purview, this is Kristen, you can't see me. Also, under Ellen's purview is master of fun. She makes everything fun. She's always the dancing Queen she she's, she's big face Ellen might be getting a pie in the face. And then you're learning you're getting now be pinhead Craig after this.
So yes, it took several years of begging for Elon to leave our old employer to come over with us. And I am thankful for her every day, especially the last two weeks when we have had purchase order after purchase order going out the door and she just doesn't get phased and get some out. So very thankful. And next we have Jacqueline, who, like I said was my first hire. And she started out in production in our basement back when this was really small. And now is in charge of our marketing efforts. So Jacqueline
hello. Um, yes, as Kelly said, I lead our creative team. And so just to give you an idea of what that consists of, we have a brand strategist, which is Kristen, who's on this call. Our social media coordinator Maggie here, we also have a graphic designer who's fabulous in house. And so my background was actually fine arts, got my BA and moved on to digital printing. So I was the production manager to digital print shop here in Denver. And starting to work at Spinster Sisters was actually a little bit of a pivot for me, because I was not thriving in production management. I wanted to do something more creative. And I was super attracted to Kelly's brand. When I saw Her job listing for her first full timer back in the days and seven years ago, she had a fantastic friend, I think a friend from high school, he said, his name's Andy Cruz, he works at PS studios. And he had put together her package her logo, a lot of the visual elements that really the visual language we still use today on our packaging. And it just drew me in. So I started working for Kelly, and was lucky enough to get to know the whole product line working in production and talking to customers and markets back when you know, it literally with that small team, everybody has to do everything even more so than when you're a team of 15. So
I feel like that was really valuable getting to talk to customers. And as soon as I could, though, I moved into web design, doing our packaging, design and leading our marketing because that's what I love. I love working in the CPG space. I think it's it's so exciting to get to take a product that, you know, it feels great, it's smells great, you know, but it's still without being in the package or going on a website, you know, what is it? People don't know. So you have to create, you know, this entire story around your product to make people know, just from seeing your product on a screen that you know, it's gonna be that incredibly amazing feeling body butter that you know, you know, it is, you know, it is so, which is actually my favorite product by the way. It's hard to I can't leave body butters it's it's I think it's been working in production because when I first started we were still doing some little tweaks to that formula to get that perfect feel. So yeah, every time a review rolls in on the website now where someone says like, Oh my gosh, body butter is because Jacqueline's tweaks that fixed it. Yeah, just like with your muscle stuff. But yeah, like when people say body butter is like, the only thing that's that's helping their cracked hands, it gives me a little more warm feeling inside. But yeah, I love that stuff is preserved with radish root. I mean, how cool is that? You have like, your parabens, and, you know, nasty stuff that can be in some lotion. So it's pretty cool. And yeah, so I'm super excited, though, to see what this raise can do for our marketing, because I see just so much potential. You know, I think we have a brand that, you know, honestly, like, when I look at a lot of brands on the shelf, I'm bored. Like, I think that a lot of new brands look the same. You know, when you look down the shelf, we really stand apart. And I think, you know, as we work more on our packaging, with actually Waven, who is here on this call from TIG, and I know some other consultants are giving us some great advice. I think we can really work on that differentiation and make it so that customers are truly understanding who we are and how we fit into their life. I'm super excited that we just got a new digital advertising partner triarc they've worked with hot tea, and re botanicals and are already doing great things. And I can't wait to see more growth there. You know, we're just starting on Facebook and Instagram, but there's a huge world out there that you can do with paid advertising. So yeah, it's pretty cool to see the traction and, and to see the company grow from, you know, Kelly's basement to, you know, walking down the aisle of Whole Foods. And my gosh, we have like, seven shelves or, you know, more shelf space than anybody else in some stores here in Denver. So, yeah, that's pretty cool. And what I’m drinking, Oh, that's right. I'm just drinking juice though funny last night. Yesterday was Jacqueline's birthday.
What a funny story about Jacqueline. Um, we were still having my friend Andy do kind of our graphic design at this point. And, and I came down with a bottle one day and I said to Jacqueline, I want to make a larger size of our body butter. So can you make this body butter fill it, you know, put the pump in and bring it back up. And I'm going to take a picture and then send it to Andy to make label and I came back upstairs to do QuickBooks or whatever thing I needed to do that day. And Jacqueline walks up about 45 minutes later and plops down a body butter on my desk with the label that she designed. That was absolutely stunning. And I went Hmm. Okay, there's hidden talent here. And I had no idea that was you know, that's the fun part about owning a business like this is you really when somebody comes into a position you really Have no idea, you know what their interest is and where their skills lie. And Jacqueline wanted this and she showed me she could do it if it was amazing. So I'm thankful for every single one of our hires. Jona's here, she actually was helping us in production as well. And just moved on to another position. But we love seeing you here, Jona. I can put Waven on the spot. I don't know Waven if you feel like introducing yourself or not.
Sure, I'll just make it really quick. I worked with Elliot and I help head up brand activation for all the brands that we work with in the TIG ohana. And I'm based in Hawaii. So I'm here taking care of my 85 year old dad, who's not in great health. So I'm working with our brands from Hawaii. We work with a lot of them for international and such. And I'm actually very delighted I'm working with Jacqueline and some of the packaging, as she mentioned, and just refining that. And it's beautiful product to start with the experience of it. The tangibility and I think as she mentioned the differentiation, I feel like she does. There's not many brands like this on the market in this category. So congrats.
Thank you. Thanks. Thanks for joining. You're welcome. So yeah, this is this is kind of our whole leadership team. As you can see, we're small and scrappy, and got a million things going on. from day to day. Did I get everybody? I got everybody did me. Um, so yeah, it's super fun. You know, I, when I started the business, it kind of came to a point fairly quickly, where I either had to choose to do my day job or choose to do Spinster Sisters. And let me tell you, one of my favorite things in the world is formulating products. And there was no decision there. You know, thankfully, I have a very supportive as let me take this leap. But it's been such an adventure and such a ride, and I have way more super fun days than I have not fun days. And that is something that not a lot of people can say. So with that said, um, do we have any Kristen? Do we have any questions we need answering?
Um there are a couple of burning questions. All right. First one that I saw was what's with all the Willy Wonka quotes in your core values.
We'd love Willy Wonka. I mean, the whole story is about opportunity and what you know, what you can make out of a world with what you're given. So, we're big fans of Willy Wonka. And let's, uh, they tell a great story. So how can you not want to be engaged in that?
love it love to hear it. Um, and I don't remember if this was in the chat, but I know that everybody wants to know every person I ever talked to you wants to know why Spinster Sisters as your company name.
Ah, yes. So my sister and I, and my family, you can't go give a gift unless you make it for Christmas. That's kind of been our rule for a while. So I had made I believe I was 25 at the time and my sister was 28. So we might have called it a little early. But I had made my first batch of soap. And she had made some Christmas ornaments and she came home one day we were living together and we always joked about being spinsters. She came home one day and said let's do this craft fair at my office and sell what we have leftover from Christmas. And I said, Well, we need a company name. And that made perfect sense to go with Spinster Sisters. So that's why we're Spinster Sisters. She did one craft fair and said, This is not for me. So she doesn't have anything to do with the company anymore. But when I you know fast forward a whole lot of years when I actually started the company full time. That was such a meaningful time in my life that it made perfect sense to me. I didn't have to think about it. I knew the company name was gonna be Spinster Sisters.
Well, that's really nice. But now it's obviously morphed into something entirely bigger than that. What does Spinster sisters mean now as a brand?
Well, you know, we have a really, really strong commitment to supporting women. We work closely with Girls Inc. In fact, we have a Girls Inc. intern. in our office right now we have at least one if not two, or three every summer. And we donate to them. We work with some women's shelters. So we're really kind of a company of women. We're also webnc certified woman owned business. So we're kind of a woman owned business supporting women. And so, again, the company name, I think, just fits.
But you know, I think it harkens back to a simpler time and reflects the need the market niche for simpler, transparent ingredients.
okay, cool. And we have a question from Carol Harwood. how committed to golden are you?
It's our home. So we're, we're committed to golden. We love it here. I grew up in Boulder, you know, just 20 miles north of here. And I just love it here. It's inspiring to me to be able to look out the windows and see the mountains and be able to go on hikes. And yeah, we're very committed to staying here. It's a great community for us. We've gotten unbelievable support since starting the business. And I would never want to walk away from that.
Yay. That's awesome. Hopefully, that satisfied you Carol as well. I thought that was fantastic answer. There's another question in here from Maggie. And I think she already knows the answer.. trouble. Can you tell us a story of how you first got into soap making it? I know, she knows the story, but it's a good one. So why don't you go ahead and share?
Yeah. Oh, and Myrtles here. Um, so yeah, so I read an article a very long time ago, in the 90s, about triclosan, which is a pretty toxic chemical that's in a lot of commercially produced skincare products. It's antibacterial, but it's a hormone inhibitor and linked to cancer and you know, just kind of a string of bad side effects. And so I kind of made the decision at that point that I didn't want to put these toxic chemicals on my skin anymore. And this was a long time ago. So it was before I even knew that Google existed, I believe. And so I wanted to learn how to make natural soap. And I hopped on my bike and rode, I was in Boulder at the time, hopped on my bike and rode down boulder bookstore and bought three books about how to make soap, and made my first batch of soap, which by some weird foresight I had I had the foresight, I guess I should say, to keep one bar of each of my first three batches of soap. So I still to this day, have one bar, which I wish I brought so you can see it. It's the saddest little thing you've ever seen before, but a logo, but I got absolutely addicted to making soap you don't think it's the case, but it's a really creative process. And it's I didn't think at the time that I had a creative bone in my body. And it's just fun. I got totally hooked on the process. Barb can attest to this, because she's also soapmaker now but yeah, it’s been a great adventure.
Very cool. Um, so yeah, Diana had a question too. Will you continue to make your bath salts, please? All caps.
It's funny, because we've been having conversations about that. You know, when we at one point, we had four retail stores of our own, and you need a lot of products to fill a retail store. So we made everything and we tried to make everything you know, we make too many things. So now we're trying to kind of rein things in to you know, really focus on what moves well for us and become more efficient. So that's one of the products that we've been thinking about. I can't say one way or the other yet, but it seems like when we started making bath bombs and shower steamers, and they really kind of took off, you know, more of the single use products. So I can't say for sure, but right after shaving We'll have something like that. I can't say it's gonna be in the same exact form, but okay.
Um, let's see. Does anyone want to unmute and ask a question verbally? Or just say hi everybody? Yeah, now's a good time. Everybody done mute. Let's have some drinks starting after six. Let's go ahead and even more casual. Um, so let's see what other questions often come up. You might have already touched on this, I don't recall what was the very first scent of soap that you ever made?
lavender, lavender, lavender, then my mom asked for Eucalyptus, then I thought I tried to get fancy and make a bar with coffee in it. But I put way too much coffee of it and it just crumbled. So there’s been successes there’s been failures. But, you know, we, we have a really strong mission to use absolutely clean plant based ingredients. And, and that, you know, our environmental impact and using those clean ingredients is is considered in every move that we make. And it's interesting, because I don't know if anybody saw this, but there was I don't even know how to say the word Craig probably well, but there's been studies published recently about PFA s. You know what that is? Yeah,
forever chemicals, they're referred to just don't get degraded. Yeah, environment,
and there's a lot in makeup. Mm hmm. You know, so it's, it's scary to me to think about that. And, and like Craig said, you know, our name and our mission kind of does harken back to ingredients, plant based ingredients that have been around for years. And, and, you know, are safe to use and, and tried and true over the years. So whenever I see a study like that come out, it's I'm so thankful that we're really thoughtful about what we make and what we do.
Kelly, are you referencing the one just came out two days ago? Yeah. Okay, fantastic.
I love that. Yeah. So the thing is, how long it takes for things to get banned, like, triclosan saying that, you know, you said back in the 90s, you started making soap to avoid using triclosan and doesn't get banned and sold 2016 Well, that's been banned for years.
So it's, I mean, the plant thing is interesting, too, because from a chemical standpoint, you know, you can end up with the same starting chemical from either plants or say petrochemical sources and and end up with the same starting material. But there was just I just read an article this Few days ago, and chemical and engineering news, which is the magazine for the American Chemical Society where they discovered a whole bunch of in some consumer products, cosmetics, traces of benzene, which is a known carcinogen. They don't really know how it got there. But the suspicion is that is just a little bit of a trace contaminant. It that ultimately comes from the petrochemical side. So even though you might, you know, there's an advantage to using the plant sourcing, I guess, almost always,
eah. Um Kelly, one of the questions on here that wasn't answered that I'm curious about is what machinery Do you plan to purchase to help with the production at the Microsoapery?
Yeah, so we, we do a lot of our production still largely by hand. And I think that there are a lot of pieces of equipment, you know, certainly I would love to have bottling lines and things like that, that, you know, you put in the body butter that's made and it spits out a packaged batch coded expiration date coded product. And those are extremely pricey, but there's equipment that we can buy right now, that and lease that will, you know, probably triple our production capacity. So they with the same amount of people. So it's, you know, it's it's filling machines, it's a there is a tube, tube filler and sealer machine that I want to get. It's more batch coating equipment, things like that. Okay. Sounds good. Thanks. Yeah. Diana, where are you located?
Diana where are you located? I'm in Westminster yes and I’ve been shopping at the store when I first discovered you I believe it was about five years ago which is why I want your bath salts. Noted, it’s noted. Thank you I tend to take a bath with you I sent it I think it was 2 years ago I took some of my jars to be refilled and there And there are rapidly working trying to make a funnel out of a piece of paper to fill it so the next time I went to get refills I'm the one that brought you the the blue funnel funny but yes I've been using the the face serum and the face cream I mean when I quit working retail after 35 years in 1994 I thought I'm never wearing makeup again I never wear heels and I'm not putting a bra unless I have to go to a wedding or funeral. But that face cream is absolutely phenomenal my skin is very sensitive so I was always really conscientious about what I put on in the morning and once I discovered your face cream then I went to the face serum and people when they ask my age and I tell them they're like there's no way and it’s like yes way I am and it’s all because of Spinster Sisters so I sell your products by word of mouth. Oh thank you that’s awesome that’s cool.
Yay and I wanna thank my husband for my birthday gift which is investing in your company. Oh thank you and to your husband too. I’ll let him know. He looks at the counter and he says well they’re all there I own more of them anyway I might as well make some money at it. I have sold so much of your hand sanitizers When we go out to restaurants and I'll come back from going to the bathroom and I'm sure it's in my hand and servers will you know the ladies in particular and I spritz their hands and where can I get those so you're currently in King Soopers on 104th Ave where I live and I tell him about the store and golden and I'm in. Oh nice you’re making us both money. I’m your public relations manager. I love it.
Jona what do you have to add? Is there anything you wanna add? Um I reckon this thing I’ve had this for more than two years I bought it at your store and I hadn’t even started working with you at that time. Oh my gosh how funny that’s awesome good job. I bought two of them and when I started working with you and when you said you weren’t going to make this anymore I froze my second one because I didn’t want it to get spoiled. This is my second one and it’s about to finish but um I really like it. Um my entire family loves the products my mom’s favorite product is the face cream my daughter pomegranate soap my husband uh muscle stuff obviously. Um mine is I love your body lotion bar because I love signature scent woohoo I love body lotion bar too yes so
One of the best little gifts when somebody does something nice for me you know I’d like to thank them I give them your lavender soap bar. And they love it just love it everybody loves lavender it’s so calming and reflective. That’s terrific thank you You are more than welcome.
Can everybody say their favorite scent? Lavender On the count of three lavender patchouli patchouli rosemary mint lemongrass yeah lemongrass sage timber yeah timber timber’s a good one timber. It’s funny my favorite is Ellen’s least favorite she hates it. It’s true I’ve got the sinus nasal appeal of a 12 year old girl Kelly’s is a little more mature.
I also really love the face cleanser scent I just love that yeah. I have been using the face cleanser and what we concocted before I left and the face cleanser and I’m loving it. Oh good yeah. So it’s working. Yeah we actually have a new product coming out thanks to Jona that’s what I was alluding to I absolutely love it so stay tuned, we just gotta get packaging figured out for it but it’s pretty terrific but it’s another face care product that oh good is gonna be fun.
So what do you think about this call was it helpful was it informative is there topics you would like us to cover in future calls? Fora first call it was extremely informative and everybody was allowed to how they came in to the company which I think is great cuz it's always nice to know what you're investing in and after this call, I’m going to tell my husband let's see Christmas is coming up oh there’s the 4th of July can we invest some more please? I’m completely sold. I mean it’s you’re already all over my body you might as well be in my bank account. Ohhhh oh my god I’m gonna use that as quote diana. A public tee? I think we need a investor tee our investor tees should say I’m on your body now I’m in your bank account. Yes we are using that somehow.
I will say that everybody every employee on this screen every one of our employees period is an investor in the company so I think that that’s a good you know certainly some more than others but I think that’s a great motivation for people as well. But is there other things that yall would like to see? I’m going to have to pop off guys thanks thanks Aaron thank you so much cheers have a nice night cheers investors thank you for investing everyone yeah that means a lot yeah talk to you all soon next call bye Aaron perfect. Yeah so if you have any suggestions we do want to have more of these calls in the future and I'm not kicking anybody else you can stay as long as you want cuz I still have more wine to drink if you have suggestions on what we can talk about in future calls this is our first time really doing this but we kind of want to get on a regular schedule of of doing these. So Kelly I have a question. Uh huh?
Is there a deadline is there a round two or how does this thing with Republic work? So the Republic campaign I think it 78 more days that we're live on Republic and so that will be round 1 and there's a possibility that there will be a round 2 it just kind of depends how much efficiencies and you know the digital marketing spend a lot of a lot of this round is going to go towards marketing spend to try that really kind of blow the roof off of our digital marketing and direct-to-consumer sales so it kind of depends on how All that goes but we haven't really you know we've kind of grown digitally organically just you know we've done some Facebook ads and things like that but we don't really do Google ads or anything like that so we're trying to invest in that to really help kind of row our direct-to-consumer sales so I kind of I imagine there will be another round at some point but I'm not sure when that will be.
I do want to tell you that one of the reasons that um we did decide to invest well he decided with me pushing him is we had our financial advisor look into your company and especially your website and your website he was particularly impressed so that's a very big plus for you. Oh that’s Jacquelyn well and Kristen does a lot of work on our website too that’s terrific thank you that’s great feedback. That was a big factor in our decision to invest other than the fact that I look young. I love it. Is this is this going is this. Thank you I just turned 71 Sunday. Oh wow seriously I would not have guess that yay Spinster Sisters. Happy birthday to you.
Um Kelly is all this meeting your expectations or how is that going?Yeah it’s great um you know we’ve never done anything like this before so I didn't really come into it with a lot of expectations but we've got some great engagement from it and even people that don't invest it you know makes them more familiar with our company and it gets them shopping on our website and and things like that so there really is no lose to this it's all win you know regardless of the outcome.
It was extremely informative to me as a new investor so I really appreciate the time you took to do this. Great cool yeah and now we have great brand ambassadors out there too. I mean I’m a big part of the investment pieces you know y'all own a piece of it now so talk it up
So the Kroger thing Is that potentially going to kind of expand to the whole Kroger brand or how how does that happen?
That's what we're working on right now one advantage that we have is that we’re women owned and you know they Kroger has a very big you know kind of minority women-owned business focus diversity focus and our products have been flying off the shelves at King Soopers so we have really good sales data on it so we actually had to call with a Kroger rep about a week and a half ago to start the process of trying to expand into other Kroger footprint like Fred Meyer and you know some of those.
What my sister who lives in Santa Rosa when I was telling her when she called to wish me happy birthday last Sunday about how Steve had invested in your company for me and so I was describing the product and how much I liked it and she looked it up and you're in a bookstore in Santa Rosa California oh yeah and she said I'm going there tomorrow and she did and she said I tried to take the face cream like you suggested she loved it absolutely loved it oh terrific. And I love that you're at King Soopers too because when I run out of the hand sanitizer I go right down the street and I can stock up and the calming spray for your bed clothing my oh yeah the room and body spray yeah. When we do Saturday day trips and what not and we're going to Glenwood Springs tomorrow for the non Strawberry Festival and you know that always that goes with me and then we went to Estes Park for anniversary in March that went with me and yeah what after a day of walking and you know all of that when you just get back to your room you just spritz and your calm. Yeah I love it too that’s great. Yeah yeah.
Well like I said I'm your new public relations manager I love it just by Word of Mouth and watch out Diana because I have your eemail now and so you might be hearing from me. Oh we have to do our drawing.
Yes oh that’s right gonna do a drawing with the folks that are here gonna do a quick little drawing sadly some people have left and you have to be present to win cuz you got to pick your scent this I am going with ah Carol Harwood you’re gonna win a we call it the Sisters Starter Set We're actually in the process of changing the name for it but for now it's called Sister's starters that and it comes in several different scents so you just so we have lavender lemongrass oatmeal and pomegranate you can choose from lemongrass I have biting bugs so Yahoo can you drop your address in the chat so we can get it shipped off to you I'll come pick it up cuz I'm local I love the fact that you have stayed local I want to stay local cover cover cover companies that have been so successful I have seen you grow from you know itty bitty to stores and you move to different locations and I just got to tell you I'm all about supporting people who value things and who are sustainable and I just love what you've done and I love your products because here's the deal I’m a knitter and I can put on your lotions and I can knit without being greasy. That’s true nice there’s another quote I love it the marketing folks are all taking notes right now You aren’t the one that did you write a review about how the body butter got rid of your velcro hands for knitting yes exactly you know when you knit I'm we’re talking about yeah and I can’t do it with greasy hands and I have to be able to knit and move on so yes perfect and I love fantastic I just love the local connection I'm a golden girl. Oh nice.
I like what she's saying about you know you put it on your able to buy hand paint pottery for living and sell it across shows when there used to be crab shows slowly coming back but you know in between washing my hands and then putting the lotion on I can go right back to painting and not have to brush slip out of my hand you know lose my place when I'm you know doing a direct line or whatever oh that’s terrific. Paints in the background here that’s true yeah it looks a little bit like our downstairs. And I’m on Etsy now look for only for you by Diana no breaks in between. Alright we’ll look for it.
I appreciate everybody joining so much and we love having you as part of the team and a few haven’t invested we would love you love to have you join the team but I just really appreciate you taking the time and it was great to see everybody so
Thank you for introducing us to our new company great yes I love it. Yes. Lindsay just said bye in chat oh missed her she didn’t she didn’t chime in at all but she did say bye at the very end there so good. Perfect.
Everybody's going to I'm going to follow up with everybody on email and then if you enjoyed this hopefully you will share with your friends and family and let them know we're going to be doing this again and then if you have any more ideas for a screw things that we can do in future rooms to make them better or just make them fun or any ideas at all please let us know you can reply to the email or just reach out to us anytime
Great thank you thank you all very much thank you it was great to see everybody thanks a lot bye everybody bye bye thanks for coming thanks for investing bye bye cheers
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