Quick Update on Grand Re-O Orders

Hello Bathing Beauties! Just a quick update and a few housekeeping items:

1. All orders from the Grand Re-O sale have been completed and are currently being packed and processed for shipping. Since I'm a one-woman show right now, I am doing everything - from start to finish. When you get a completed notification from CLC, it means that your goodies have been made and are now waiting to be labeled, bagged with pretty little things, packed in a box with more pretty little things and then processed for shipment. So there may be a day or two lag between when you get a completed notice and a Click & Ship notification. Orders are processed in batches for efficiency.

Apparently, there was a lot of hoarding going on (hey, I said hoarding you dirty mind you)! I received a number of large orders for either A) a particular product or B) a particular scent or C) A whole lotta both!!! You ladies crack me up, I swear.

2. I am now processing orders placed the week of 2/4/08. Keep in mind that orders placed on or after this date is subject to a 10 to 12 business day TAT as stated in our website.

3. What is the deal with USPS? I've been nervously tracking the first batch of packages that went out because of all the bad weather we've been having on the east coast. Anyway, it took about 3 or 4 business days for an order to get from Peekskill, NY to Stony Point, NY? What I noticed is that even though I drop off my packages at our local post office, they get processed in Kearny, NJ. Not sure what this is about, but I'm going to ask Jimmy, my USPS rep and fellow Ranger fan. (Let's go Rangers!)

4. For those who ordered a product in Dark Pink - let it cure! Although this applies to all products, it does so even more in this case. Dark Pink is a very heavy oil blend and it will take some time for the oils to bind. If you think your stuff smells good now, wait another week or two and holy sexiness Bath Girl - it smells even better. It's ironic really that one of our best selling blends is also the most temperamental!

I think that's about it. What's in the works right now? I'm looking at tweaking my detangler formulation which I will then put out to test. I'm still at the concept stage of two product developments, although I may just focus on one right now simply because I don't have the time to do both and I'm finalizing the scents for the spring/summer collection. Oh and in March, CLC will be participating in a NYC fundraiser, along with all the other wonderful businesses that make up Marmalade Pink.

Sleep? Who needs sleep?

A Day in the Life of a Crazed E-tailer

First and foremost, thank you, thank you, thank you for making the Grand Re-O such a huge success. It was so wonderful hearing from past customers and meeting new ones. Man, y'all haven't changed! Still on the Dark Pink & Walking on Moonbeams kick eh? I'm tracking the top 10 selling scents and will post a new list by month's end.

Okay I finally have a moment now that I've made a significant dent in the pile of orders that came in from the Grand Re-O and the wonderful write-up from Wickedly Chic.

I recently joined Marmalade Pink, a wonderful co-op made up of independent business owners. I'd like to credit my MP sisters as I like to call them, for keeping me sane during the craziness surrounding the Grand Re-O. Behind the businesses that make up MP are some of the most passionate, kind and intelligent women with whom I now have the honor of being associated. It truly is an honor to be part of this great organization. Marmalade Pink is the brainchild of Liz Nonnemacher and Amy Steinberg. I firmly believe that neither one of these women sleep as they are so adept at juggling all the demands of their busy lives.

I liken Liz and Amy to Jason Bourne. Think about it. Throughout the entire movie, we never see the guy eat or sleep. If you watch the movie again, try to find a scene where the handsome Bourne is doing something human like say - eating or resting. I don't even think the guy bathed? Did he? Man, imagine how much calmer and cool-headed he would've been if he had a jar of Comforting Creme scented in Walking on Moonbeams. Anyway, I digress. I stand in awe of Liz and Amy for all the wonderful things they do for their business endeavours, family and friends.

Okay, so right after joining MP, I get an e-mail from Amy asking me for a picture of myself to put on the MP site. I belly-ached. I stalled. Do I have to? How about just a picture of my Cream & Sugar Scrub? No, a picture would be nice. So I dig through 4 CDs worth of pictures and find a non-scary one of me. Darn you Salma Hayek for being first in line when they were handing out the sultry good looks, bodacious body and big hair potion. You too Angelina.

I reluctantly send my pic to Amy with a note saying that I may just drive over to Walmart and buy one of them glamour shot packages. Preferably, I say, I'd like to be photographed frolicking in a forest in a fairy princess outfit, busting out some VOGUE moves. Here's what Amy sends back to me...

Nice Amy. Real nice. On second thought, I'll do without the fairy princess outfit. It just doesn't communicate super-model glamour does it?

Well, there you have it folks. I am currently a one-woman show so on top of all the production demands, I also have to deal with issues such as trying to find a decent enough picture of me to show the entire, freakin' world.

I hope I've set the record straight and shed some insight into the life of a bath & body e-tailer. It's not all about the glamour of editorial pictures, lotions, potions and perfumes ladies. I know, I know, you all think we wake up in the morning, all soft and smooth and smelling good (umm, actually, we probably do, just given our line of work).

Okay, let me start again. You probably think we wake up at 4:30 a.m., lean over and kiss our SO's good morning as he begs for just one more sniff of our wonderfully fragrant locks. Then we hop on our treadmills, run 5 - sub-7 minute miles, lift weights for muscle tone, do 12,398 sit-ups without breaking a sweat and cool-down with an intense 1 hour session of Bikram yoga - all the while answering customer inquiries in a timely manner with our Blackberries. At 7:00 a.m. we take our abs and buns o' steel (mine's more like Abs o' Noodles and Butt o' Jiggly) and take a refreshing shower with products from our oh-so fabulous line of bath and body goodies before heading off to our glamorous office filled with glamorous employees. NOT. At least not for me anyway - and I'm cool with that!

In all seriousness, my next entry will probably be a behind the scenes look at CLC operations. That, and I've been asked to blog about my personal favourites from our line.

Okay, I'm off to work on my 6-pack abs - which right now bears a striking resemblance to a keg.