Chaseburg Farmer Finds New Use for Goat Milk Soap
Posted by Unknown in Goat Farming, Milk, Soap on Monday 28 January 2013
(LaCrosse Tribune)
CHASEBURG — Meghan Klum was throwing away a few buckets of extra goat
milk every day on her family farm. Klum, who began raising goats with
her mother in 2007, was looking for a way to lessen that blow when one
day in March 2010 the answer came in the mail: soap.
“I had never heard of goat milk soap before,” said Klum, 26. “So I thought, ‘Why not?’”
Now
the kitchen in the small Chaseburg farmhouse is filled with scents of
sweet pea and roses. Soap shavings sit in a big kettle on a worn stove. A
few soap bars sit hardening on a nearby counter. Klum digs a spoon into
a pot of goat milk as oils heat on the burner.
The extra milk
she uses in her soaps comes from mothers who recently gave birth.
Farmers can’t sell that milk, so the Klums usually just gave some to the
farm animals and tossed the rest.
“We decided to try and make a few extra dollars with the soap,” Klum said. “I went for it and have been doing it ever since.”
It didn’t come
easy for the first-time soap maker, who learned of the trade from a
mailed flyer that provided goat farming news and tips. The first batch
burned. Klum hadn’t paid enough attention to the heat levels.
But after a few
trial-and-error runs — and plenty of free misshapen soap bars for
friends — Klum got her recipe down right. She named it Mama’s Milk Soap.
Next step: get it to the people.
That didn’t come easy, either.
“I couldn’t
figure it out,” Klum said. “Then I thought, if I was buying soap, why
would I pay $3 when I could pay 50 cents at department stores?”
Klum turned to the Internet and found a primary benefit of using goat milk soap: a moisturizer for dry and sensitive skin.
She began
attaching labels to her soaps touting the benefit. She now sells up to
60 bars a month — and has seen a complete turnaround in her own
once-dry-and-scaly skin.
Klum eventually wants to start crafting shampoos and liquid soap.
“It makes me
happy,” she said, as she spooned a pile of pink soap bits into a pan.
“The smells are great and it’s just fun to do.”
And the farm rarely throws out a gallon of goat milk.
