Interesting....can one start without the machines and make it?

Following

Ok

Jac007:



Wetin consine you na...at least we are here learning how to make soap. Share us pictures from your company since you don't do bet9ja

sorry lil man,i'm into transportation. biz/and banking work dey pay me.Listen up! Gambling in woteva form can't. sustain. u.

great

I pitch my tent here.

Hoping to get the best motivation to start mine. If only it is really worth venturing into d biz.

Cosmetic chemist is my mentor. Hoping to tap from you too.

more

Nice one Op, really wish to learn something from here.

Following

motemi111:

Weldone boss, and more power to your elbow. Pls how much do you get those cartons and how much does it cost to print on them?

first you need what they call base. It is what they use for the printing. It is more or less like the stencil. It will cost between 2.5k to 3k. The carton cost #70 for one including the printing.

I feel glad after seeing this post. I have always had a vision of owing a soap factory. Please sir I would be glad if you could create a forum where you will teach and tutor those who are interested in this business.
And seminar too.
Thanks and may God continue to increase you.

Thanks for this thread. Will be Following you like a monitoring spirit.

iHart:
first you need what they call base. It is what they use for the printing. It is more or less like the stencil. It will cost between 2.5k to 3k. The carton cost #70 for one including the printing.

Thanks bro, are the cartons new or re-used?

God bless you abundantly. You are a source of inspiration.

iHart:
Greetings.

I want to take out a small space here to tell the story of how I started a soap making business. The essence of this is to help those who may wish to venture into the soap business and also to inspire people to try out some entrepreneurial ventures (not necessarily soap making). I must say that many stories and individuals here have added to my inspiration. People like Cosmeticchemist, Gbadexy, O2 soap (O2 Nigeria), Blackkie (Britishknight or 1kingwriter), Jasper7, through their stories have inspired me so much into believing "I can do it if only I put my mind to it". So I wish to help and inspire more people.

In the course of this story we are going to see how I was able to get my machines, learn and start soap making business. I hope to find time to attend to every questions as much as I can. By the end of the day, depending on how it goes, we may have to conduct a live seminar for those who will want to go into small scale soap making business. If possible, we may consider creating a small group of partners and then crowd funding to help them setup and manage a tangible small scale soap making business. We will also discuss and interact with existing soap makers who are having difficulties in running there business due cost, and map out strategies to move forward effectively and efficiently.

We fabricate and install efficient soap making machines and equipment. We also manage soap making facilities on contract basis. We conduct test run for already installed machines. We train company staff on soap making. We are also open to partnership. Fill free to contact me for your enquiries on soap making business. Check my signature for my contact phone number.

Thank you.

sir can I get your contact

jidobaba:
Bookmarked.
Op, I'm interested in the figures. Without going into any detail, In all honesty, would you say that this is a lucrative venture?
What is the average ROI, running costs, manpower (for this your scale of #5million)?
Hard figures please, you can go into detail later.

being lucrative is relative. just relax and follow up, you will get hard figures when the time comes

Richiez:
Did you brand the soap you produce? If yes, what are the challenges you've encountered so far regarding company registration, product trademark, NAFDAC, SON etc.

Also, did you rent the factory or you built the factory from the scratch? How much did it cost you to do this, get the machines and do all necessary registrations?

I'm seriously following this thread, i'm particularly interested in the discussion about your business plan. Although I have plans of going into production of something different (not soap), but I have no doubt I'll learn a lot from this thread.

Business registration was handled by a lawyer. NAFDAC and SON won't be a problem as I know how they are done. When the time comes I will do them too.

The factory is located in our garage, a garage built for two cars.

Just keep a date, we will x-ray the business plan bit by bit.

motemi111:

Thanks bro, are the cartons new or re-used?

they have what they call virgin carton and those that are not virgin. Both are used cartons but virgin cartons don't have inscriptions written inside why non virgin have inscriptions written inside, like indomie cartons... If you bargain very strong you will get the virgin at the same price as the non virgin.

Mine are virgin cartons, take a closer look at the picture.

iHart:
being lucrative is relative. just relax and follow up, you will get hard figures when the time comes

Ok boss. Following!

iHart:
they have what they call virgin carton and those that are not virgin. Both are used cartons but virgin cartons don't have inscriptions written inside why non virgin have inscriptions written inside, like indomie cartons... If you bargain very strong you will get the virgin at the same price as the non virgin.

Mine are virgin cartons, take a closer look at the picture.

Do you handle contract manufacturing?

Can you fabricate 100kg/hr spray drying system?
What is the heating arrangement for your soap boiling kettle?

Where did we stop?

Ok, lets look at what informed the capacity i choose to start with.

I started making sketches on paper, which later turned out to be my business plan. While i was going round visiting soap firm, i noticed that this business is power consuming. You will need electricty to do this business effectively. I travelled down to my proposed location to examine the level of electricity there. I was so glad to see that they have a relative good supply of electricty, but they had challenges with their transformer. It seems the transformer have heavy load . My factory was going to add to the load, and i was afraid it may not work. So I had to decide to reduce the capacity of my proposed factory from 70kw to 40kw. With that in mind i split it for the machines as follows; Plodder-7.5HP to 10HP, boiler-5HP to 10HP, crutcher-20HP to 25HP, cutting table-2HP. ...and i also researched on the probable output capacity of the machines if they have my proposed energy consumption. If you add it up, it won't be above 40Kw (lets leave out the conversion from HP to KW). This one is not necessary but i must tell you, it informed my decision. You don't want put up a firm where you don't have electricity to power it. With that in mind, i proceeded to writing the business plan. I conducted a feasibility study which helped me to tidy my business plan. The feasibility study included a lot of paper work and market study which I may not be able to explain in details here.

heavenmade:
Can you fabricate 100kg/hr spray drying system?
What is the heating arrangement for your soap boiling kettle?

If I see the spray drier, i will be able to do it.

There is no heating arrangement for my soap boiler as i use hot caustic, but the boiler could be jacketed to use hot fluid or steam.

qleap2all:

Do you handle contract manufacturing?

Yes, you can contact me for further discussion...

Why is it that Nigerian artisanal business people always veer into training.

You see make up artistes more concerned with getting training clients. Same with cake makers and the OP, rather than advertise his brand of soap is advertising his training of potential soap makers.

Perhaps it's more profitable to teach than to do, huh?

Please i need your phone no

...I continued with my business plan as i figured out how i was going to get my machines. Work was weighing me down and it was not paying well, so i decided to resign and pursue my dream. In my former place of work, we had this visiting engr. He is a artisan engr who has lots of working tools in his office (lathe, drill, among others). Even though they looked old, those machines do wonders. He fabricated spare parts for our machines,.. even parts i felt were foriegn he did them neatly. He has some expertise in fabrication, so I made out time to discuss my plans with him. That discussion was the begining of what turned out to be the soap factory we are discussing today. I told him i wanted to learn machine fabrication. He opted to teach me free if only i will teach his younger brother paint production. He complained a lot about his younger brother who wouldn't want to do anything. He was ready to fabricate paint mixer for his brother and empower him. I just jumped into the deal with my both leg. .

God bless you, thank God it made it to front page

...so i resigned. That was to be the hardest decision i have made. I felt it badly but i had to move on.

Few weeks later, i resumed my traing at his workshop. Unfortunately his brother didn't want to learn paint production again. He is now talking about something else. Imagine me, graduate don come down to learn welding and fabrication and an ssce dey feel too big. Well, he is a small boy and life haven't taught him any lesson. Well, the engr didn't bother much. My training continued as discussed with the hope that his brother will change his mind. unfortunately, He never did.

Later on we started discussing my machines and how it was going to be done. He asked me to get all the necessary parts and we work on them. We set out on another journey to visit soap firms to study their machines, take pictures and take measurments. Already, i had pictures and videos from youtube. We went round, visited some firm took pictures and measurements. We even visited some of his colleagues who have experience in soap equipment. I won't forget an Engr i met as we journeyed. He worked in the defunct RIVOK. He gave us the "engr drawing" of a plodder. He was not going to charge me much, I rallied round to buy some things. That was prior to Buhari's regime, things were really cheap as compared to today. The little money I had then could only get things for plodder, boiler and cutting table, so i got those stuffs.

picture 1: Training ongoing
picture 2: Visiting firms, taking pictures and measurements.
picture 3: Visiting other fabricators and checking out their work.
Picture 4: In the market picking some metal parts

iHart:
Greetings.

I want to take out a small space here to tell the story of how I started a soap making business. The essence of this is to help those who may wish to venture into the soap business and also to inspire people to try out some entrepreneurial ventures (not necessarily soap making). I must say that many stories and individuals here have added to my inspiration. People like Cosmeticchemist, Gbadexy, O2 soap (O2 Nigeria), Blackkie (Britishknight or 1kingwriter), Jasper7, through their stories have inspired me so much into believing "I can do it if only I put my mind to it". So I wish to help and inspire more people.

In the course of this story we are going to see how I was able to get my machines, learn and start soap making business. I hope to find time to attend to every questions as much as I can. By the end of the day, depending on how it goes, we may have to conduct a live seminar for those who will want to go into small scale soap making business. If possible, we may consider creating a small group of partners and then crowd funding to help them setup and manage a tangible small scale soap making business. We will also discuss and interact with existing soap makers who are having difficulties in running there business due cost, and map out strategies to move forward effectively and efficiently.

We fabricate and install efficient soap making machines and equipment. We also manage soap making facilities on contract basis. We conduct test run for already installed machines. We train company staff on soap making. We are also open to partnership. Fill free to contact me for your enquiries on soap making business. Check my signature for my contact phone number.

Thank you.

, I am interested in become a distributor of your product . I have dealings with virony(detergents), sumal(yale foods) and dangote noodles. 08164093816. Only text msg,pls

Following keenly