Our adventure started with Dean dreaming of having our own family business. The little dilapidated farm we had purchased was my dream. Goats were my idea, after all, they were so practical for their milk, provided endless entertainment and… well, good at getting into trouble.
We drank the milk they provided and what we couldn’t drink we made into yogurt and cheese. Then after helping a friend make soap, I began researching and experimenting with that formulation of goat milk soap. I wanted to make the best soap I could for our family and friends. Dean, on the other hand had always wanted his own business. He put a basket of our soaps out when we were having a yard sale. I was surprised that my soaps sold out quickly. Now Dean had been thinking for a while he would like to create a business on this new thing called the “World Wide Web”. He had been working in computer technology since he graduated from college and was eager to learn about this new www. So naturally Dean decided we should sell my soaps on it.
I thought he was crazy and I was not interested in making soaps as a business. I was homeschooling our 2 young children along with taking care of the garden, chickens, goats , cats and a dog. Eventually he got me to commit to making two batches of soap a week. At that time my batch size was 9 bars of soap. Dean partnered with a friend from work to create a webpage as an online craft fair. The idea was to make it easy for crafters to sell their creations on an online store (years before Etsy thought of it). It opened for business December 1998 with me providing goat-milk soap, candles and some other crafts I made. By early 1999 the site had several crafters including our 12 year old son who made his popular Rice bags for therapeutic warm moist heat. In a few months there were over 60 crafters selling everything from Art to Wedding photos and everything in between. In February 2000, our soaps had become so popular Dean decided we should concentrate solely on our family business, newly incorporated, “Alabu Inc”.
I never knew your backstory. How interesting! I first found out about your products at the Mercantile in Middleburgh, Schoharie County. When you moved, they told me you were now online, and the rest is history 🙂