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Aug. 31--A bit of peppermint, some goat's milk and a crockpot. When Gary Birch and Hagan Amburgey start mixing ingredients, it's for the skin as well as the soul.

The duo formed Old Fort Soap Co. about 1 1/2 years ago after creating their own concoctions for skin ailments and gifts for family and friends a year before that.

"I want to make soap and products I'll use," said Amburgey, who said he has dry skin. "I don't like to itch."

Using the slogan "Natural soap for your natural skin," the two use all-natural oils, including olive, coconut and even emu; extracts and herbs such as rosemary and lavender; and the milk of goats, coconuts and cows. They add FDA-approved food color to some. Their bars provide a delicious variety that includes key lime, cucumber melon, pear and berry, raspberry rush, oatmeal and mango, along with a popular seller, patchouli.

Each bar costs $3.50; a loaf, equal to 10 bars, is selling on their Web site for $29, plus $9 for shipping and handling. Internet orders require a minimum order of three bars, plus $1 for shipping and handling.

They also sell a couple of varieties of bath salts, including cucumber, for $2.

Not all their products are included on the Web site of their company, which has the origin of its name in Marion native Amburgey's interest in pioneer days.

Some bars (weighing 4.3-5 ounces each, depending on the hand-cutting) and loaves are made in a hot process with a crock-pot, others with a cold process. They've been making soap every other day.

"To me, it's an art form," Amburgey said. "It's hard to re-create the exact same formula."

Amburgey says store-bought soaps are usually petroleum-based to maintain their hardness and contain no skin-loving glycerin.

Old Fort's soaps shouldn't be left in water, so customers get a lesson in protecting their investment.

"The longer it air-dries, the harder it gets and lasts," Amburgey told one woman, so keep it off the shower soap shelf.

New ideas abound. On Aug. 22, at their second appearance at the weekly Barr Street Market, Birch held up $2 sachets they had added to their product line.

Amburgey pointed out the new brightly colored rainbow bars textured with ridges from a dough cutter that they hoped would be a hit with kids. Amburgey, who works as a wine specialist, described their ideas of working with wine and beer in formulas, along with creating holiday ornaments, and gave Birch a look when describing the latter's idea of possibly doing holiday deliveries.

Business appears to be good.

"We had a line before we opened," Amburgey said. Word must have spread after they sold out of eucalyptus and rose bars Aug. 15. One woman had bought a shea butter bar, which includes 25 percent shea butter, in hopes of some relief from a problem, said Birch, a Ligonier native who works in auto financing.

She was so impressed, she went to their Web site and bought a whole loaf.

Credit: The News-Sentinel, Fort Wayne, Ind.

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