(HINTON, IA) Six years ago, Vanessa Wodtke used her birthday money to buy goats. Her family drank the milk as part of becoming more sustainable. But now, there's only enough to make ice cream on special occasions because Vanessa created a home business that's in high demand. She makes all natural goat milk soap products from scratch.
"It's just like any baking process. You measure everything ahead of time, that way if you screw up, you're not in the middle of a time constraint," says Vanessa Wodtke, Windy Acres Natural Farm Products.
Soap making is part science and part art.
"In the process of making soap, you take an alkaline and a fat," says Wodtke. "It actually blends it on a molecular level. And you get a more consistent product."
"So just pour it in," explains Wodtke. "In 24 hours, I'll slide it out. And then we let it sit another 24 hours and then cut it."
Vanessa creates all of her own scents from essential oils and plant botanicals.
"I really try to be as natural as I can about it. And most of the stuff that I put in my soap, all of it, with the exception of the lye, you can eat," says Wodtke.
Even the labels help reduce her carbon footprint.
"It matters to a lot of my customers that I use as little packaging as possible," says Wodtke.
And those customers are driving demand.
"I haven't had anybody say that they couldn't use it or they didn't like it," says Wodtke. "The goat's milk has the same pH as human skin and so it's really gentle on your skin."
Vanessa started making soap about four years ago and selling at the Sioux City Farmer's Market two years later.
"I milked two goats this year and I'll probably milk three next year," says Wodtke.
Vanessa milks her goats April through August but makes soap year–round so she stores hundreds of gallons in her deep freeze. She's already filled up this one and plans on buying another.
"It pleases them and so it pleases me because I feel like I'm doing what I'm called do to," says Wodtke.
And that's what keeps this earth–friendly entrepreneur motivated to make more.
"When I'm in the garden or working with the animals or mixing the essential oils, I feel like I'm utilizing the gifts that we've been given," says Wodtke.
Right now, Vanessa makes her goat milk soap and a number of other all–natural products in her home kitchen and sells only at the market or through special orders. Eventually, she'd like to expand and open a shop to sell dried herbs, essential oils and her soap.
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