My road to the rally, part 2

Hey, so, I left something out.

I saw my first Redditor on the line at Port Authority. I handed him a sample soap, he looked at it and said "Uh, thanks..." smelled it, and I walked away.

So, we get to the station.

At this point, we'll be discussing the pain.

My legs were hurting already, because of the way I was sitting.

I got off the bus and felt like a pilgrim in an unholy land.

Ok, not really.

I walked for a bit until I couldn't figure out where I was supposed to be heading. Luckily, I fell in with that Redditor and his buddy, and he gets out his iPhone and a GPS app. "This way, gentlemen!" he said in an authoritative voice, pointing. If he had a barrel, or a fallen enemy, or perhaps a wild animal, he would have put a triumphant foot upon it.

Maybe spear a flag into the ground.

So, we started walking. Fast. I'm carrying 30lbs of soap, you know? But I'm keeping up a good pace. I mention the bag after these University boys ask me if it's full of beer. Sigh. No, it's not. This is the Rally to Restore Sanity, not get drunk and act like morons.

For some reason this reminds me of a scene from Spinal Tap.

Ian Faith: The Boston gig has been cancelled...
David St. Hubbins: What?
Ian Faith: Yeah. I wouldn't worry about it though, it's not a big college town.

Sigh. No, not beer. It's 35lbs of soap!

So, we get to walking, and we can hear echos. Echos of yelling. Music. Crowds. Pretty unreal.

We keep walking. Now, let's see if I can detail how far of a walk it was. Let me get a map.

Ok, so, we walked from the bus station (red circle) to down the National Mall.



I lost them about half way there. A woman started talking to me and asking me if I was glad to be there. I said I was, but was upset I was missing the rally. She said that didn't matter. I agreed and disagreed.

She said she had been to three different inaugurations, for Clinton, Bush, and Obama. She said she hadn't seen that many people at any of those, than she did at the Rally. I thought that was pretty unreal.

So. I'm all alone. I have a 40lb bag of soap and people keep bumping into me. I even said "Hey, I'm just the guy with the 45lb bag of soap. COME ON!"

I walked back to 3rd and Madison.



Feeling forever alone, I sat on a rock and watched two daschunds play for a bit. I watched people walk around, and I desperately looked for Redditors, whom I did not find. There was no enjoying the show. I couldn't hear anything, I couldn't see anything, and the crowd, while well mannered, was too thick to walk at a respectable gait.

At this point, I spoke with my girlfriend, then my mom, updating them on my day. I sat on the rock for a bit, people watched, took some video, and was then struck with an irony so deep, so sad, that I had to call my girlfriend again.

"You do realize that while you're in the comfort of our apartment, lounging, watching television, you're able to enjoy the Rally, while I'm actually AT the rally, and I can't enjoy it?"

She laughed.

I started crying.

So, she said "Well, I saw this report earlier about people in Washington, DC, people who actually live there, who said they were going to go to the Rally, saw the trains were packed to the gills, and decided not to go, so why don't you head over to that restaurant I told you about, and get some food, then head to the after party."

She's so smart.

So, that's what I did.

She asks me where I am. I tell her. She goes on google and finds me the closest metro station. I say great. Which way is North?

"You can see the sun, right?"

I said yeah.

"So, figure out where North is."

"I... what, do I look like an Arawak?" (I just started reading Zinn's History of the United States)

Sigh, ok, I'll say something funnier.

"I... what do I look like, a..."

Shit, I've got nothing. I said "I could tell you what time it is..."

"Just figure it out. Go here, go left, go left again, it's right there."

So I say ok. I hang up and go to the first official looking person I can find, which is an ambulance driver. She says "That way. Bend to the left. It's Union Station. That's the closest."

Fantastic.

See, now, I didn't know where the hell I was. Union Station sounds like, you know, a good place to go.

The problem was, Union station was all the way back near the goddamn bus station. Here I am, carrying 40lbs of soap... but I didn't realize I was heading in the direction I came from. So I walk back.



I know that white line might be hard to see, but that's the way back.

I stop someone on the way, ask her if I'm heading in the right direction. She says yes. I ask how far. She says about a third of a mile.

Here's where the rest of the pain starts. I've given away, at this point, 1 sample bar.

I'm holding 45lbs of soap and my messenger bag. I feel like I'm slowly dying. I feel like I'm on the second day of The Long Walk and Vegas odds have me buying the farm next.

Once at Union Station, I took the red line to Dupont Circle. The train was empty. So empty that I was able to get a seat, which was awesome. Sitting down was like shutting off the switch on the electric chair, and still being alive.

But not for long.

I had five stops until Dupont. The first stop... not so bad.

The second stop must have been just shy of the mall. In retrospect, I'm happy the ambulance driver told me to walk to Union Station, because this is what it felt like two stops in:



It was insane.

Three stops later, I was able to push myself out, using my 50lb bag of soap as a battering ram. No one smelled as good, or felt as run over, as those did in my path.

Out of the train, I felt I could not only breathe again, but that my blood lust had suddenly dissipated.

Out at Dupont Circle I was able to find my way thanks to a local Washington resident, made my way around the Circle and found myself on Connecticut Avenue. There, I found the coolest place in town.

Now, I hadn't been in town that long, you know, but it's safe to say that there is no place cooler than Kramerbooks & Afterwords Cafe, who have an awesome place, but wow, what a crappy website...

I got in looking to get a cup of coffee and maybe a dessert or something, I don't know. I had a fresh copy of Howard Zinn's book with me, and I wanted to make a dent in it before the after party. So, I head to the reservation desk and I meet Annie, a very nice young lady who is taking seat requests. One for 3, one for 4, one for 2. I walk up and put one finger up in the air and look sheepishly tired. She smiles. "Just one?"

"Please. I've been wearing the same underwear for twelve hours."

"Oh, in that case, half an hour."



"For chrissake, is there any place other than starbucks I can get a cup of coffee and sit down?"

She thinks for a minute, beckons me closer. "Try Dupont Cafe, across the street."

"Thanks," I say, and head over.

Well, no. That place felt like if I didn't have an MBA, I was not welcome. Also, it was empty. Sure sign.

I walk back. "Yeah, listen, don't ever send anyone over there again, ok? I felt like I needed an MBA to walk in there," I said. I know I already said it to you, but in the interest of full disclosure.

She laughed, looked at her sheet. "Ok, I'm gonna put you in front of all these people."

"Wow, ok," I said, and dug deep into my bag of samples and grabbed her a full bar of Soapert soap. "Here," I said.

"What is this?"

"Soap. It's for the Colbert Rally, for some friends of mine. I only brought 5 of them, so, you know, don't use it. Don't even look at it. Just, you know, smell it."

"Wow, so, I can sell it on eBay for thousands of dollars?"

"No, jeez, it's just soap."

I got a table about three minutes later. You didn't know, did you, that I was so charismatic and charming? Did you!?

So, yeah, I sit down, and Anne comes to my table. No, not Anne, I mean Jen! Jen, yeah.

We talk for a moment, I order decaf coffee and apple pie ala mode. And it was awesome.

I read for a bit, and Anne/Jen comes over and says "Hey, my friend is a big fan of Reddit."

So, I tell her the story of Soapier, and I give her some samples for her and her Reddit friend, who thanked me on Reddit. That was awesome.

The bag does not feel lighter. In fact, after sitting, it felt like I went into default mode, back to a weaker state of being.

I leave and head over to the One Lounge, across the street. I get there and I find more of those amazing inventions...

My road to the Rally (part 1)

My road to the Rally to Restore Sanity, Truthiness, Keeping Fear Alive, and all of the other sub-names, was one of doubt, excitement, frustration, sore feet, sore hands, disappointment, hunger, awesomeness, exhaustion, and exhaustion.

Let's start at Doubt.

After hearing about the Rally, and what I truly believe to be Reddit's enormous contribution to making it happen, I knew that I had to be a part of it. I didn't know in what capacity, but I wanted to be there. To share in the message, meet like-minded people, and get together with a fantastic group of people who, directly or indirectly, helped my family and I.

So, I started getting in touch with some of the Reddit admins. Or, I should say, I tried to get in touch with them. Running Reddit clearly takes devotion, passion, expertise... and time. Suffice it to say, while the Reddit Admins work hard every day, their work became exponentially more time consuming as the Rally got closer.

So, I didn't hear back from them. With good reason.

As the date got closer, I became more doubtful of my attendance. There was going to be a Reddit booth, maybe. I was hoping to be there. Maybe. I was planning on bringing samples. Maybe. Then there was no booth. Scratch the samples. Ok, maybe stickers. That would be cool.

Would it be cool? Eh, I don't know. Maybe I'll just show my face, I don't know.

A week before the Rally, I didn't think I was going to go. I hadn't heard back from anyone about a spot for me (not that I deserved one, but I wanted to see if I could get one, at a Reddit booth, or what-have-you...)

Now, two weeks before the rally, I had sent an e-mail to Reddit about advertising. I wanted to do some holiday advertising, and wanted to run some 250X300 banners.

Got in touch with a woman I hadn't heard of before at Reddit, who basically said that the advertising on Reddit had picked up steam, and the amount of money that we were willing to spend would not get us any real facetime on Reddit. Well, that was too bad, but she offered a solution.

Oh, 'she' is Lia. I'm not actually sure what her Reddit name is, but yeah.

So, she says 'we'll get you some ads of the Reddit Aliens and envelopes. We'll do that!'

Well, that was great news. Just in time for Secret Santa, and the holidays, for opening the UK store... awesome. Reddit has, time and again, does what it can to help us out. It's greatly appreciated.

So, a week goes by, it's a week before the Rally, I can't get in touch with anyone, and I'm sitting down on my mom's couch in Tampa, and we're talking about the rally and...



Heyyyyyyyyyyyy. Why not call this woman at Reddit? She foolishly left her work number on the bottom of her first email.

So I call her.

And she was like "They didn't get in touch with you? Oh, I'll take care of that, don't you worry!"

Ok, she didn't say any of that, but that's how it sounded. She got in touch with HueyPriest and he got back to me straight away, put me on the party VIP list and I turn to my mom and say "Uhhhh, so, yeah."

She shakes her head. "No. Nope. Uh-uh."

"Yeah."

"No, J."

"Yeah."

"Then you do it. I'm watching HGTV."

I can't, for the life of me, get away from HGTV. My girl watches it, my mom...

Here starts the Excitement phase.

So, I started making these:



6 trays, 16 soaps a tray. 3 trays at a time. Each layer has to be done separately, obviously, and cooled/hardened the next. So, it took some time.

Then I made these:



Full bars.

While I'm making them, I start looking for a way to get down to DC from NYC. Train is too expensive. Flying is out. Am I staying over a night or what? Hotel prices are crazy. Hostel's are sold out. Staying with a stranger isn't going to happen. I'm just too good looking.

What? I AM!

So, I decide on leaving at 6:30am Saturday morning, and coming back at 10pm. But that won't work, because the after party starts at 5... that's not enough time to meet everyone.

So, a Saturday 6:30am bus down, 1:15am bus Sunday morning back home. Yeah. That'll do it.

I'm 37. I should have known my body was going to revolt. I should have known.

I bought the tickets.

Got the soaps all finished, then I wrapped each one, labeled them, packaged them up, and got them all off in time before I came back to NY.

I also added some Reddit Alien soaps and and Envelope set. Alexis wanted one for his father, and I figured I'd give some out to people, and show them off.

I got them three days later, and lost five to a dented side, on the box. Sigh. So, all told, I had 91 samples, 5 large bars, 3 Alien soaps, and 1 Envelope set. Which leads us to...

FRUSTRATION.

How in the hell was I going to carry all of this?

That's about... well, let's see. Each sample bar is 2oz. Each Alien is 10oz. Each large bar is 6oz. Each envelope set is 8oz.

That's... 2... carry the 1... about 16lbs.

No. No way. Absolutely no way was that only 16lbs. It weighed like I was holding 3 bricks... which is about 18 pounds.



Fine. So, I was telling people at the Rally after party that it was like 40 lbs worth of soap. That's what it felt like.

I borrow a knapsack from my friend Elke and start putting them in there. All nice and neat, I put the rest of the things I'm bringing into the bag, put out my clothes for the night, and go to sleep. Or half sleep. I didn't sleep well that night.

I went to bed at 10pm, but didn't fall asleep until 11:30, and then woke up every half hour or so. It happens, every time I have to wake up at a certain time that's earlier than normal. So, I slept like crap.

Woke up, got ready, lifted up the knapsack that I had borrowed from a friend and said "Nope. No. Not gonna happen."

Yeah, there's no way it was only 16lbs. Christ, that bag was heavy. So I put it in a carry bag, brought my messenger bag... yeah, great idea John. Let's not put it all in one bag, let's unevenly distribute it in two. Perfect.

Sigh.

Eat breakfast, wash my face, brush my teeth, say goodbye to Karen and the kitties, and I head out the door.

The first thing I notice is IT'S COLD.

The second thing I notice is I'm exhausted.

I walk the fifteen blocks or so to the subway station, get down there, and a train approaches. I'm on the A line, and it's a straight shot to Port Authority. Well, it's not an A. Not a C... it's an F. I don't have to tell you what I proceeded to read into, that F.

I sit down, let it pass, and wait 20 minutes for... another F train. Oh man.

I run outside the station, flapping my hands too and fro, and catch a cab. "To Port Authority!"

We catch every single light for sixty blocks, no fooling. It was like some force was making sure we get there with some time to spare.

Awesome.

I get there, pay the guy, grab my 20lb bag of soap, and go into Port Authority where I find... the Information desk is shut.

There's a sign that says "Oh, hey, there's another one down there."

Ok, so I go down there. That one has a sign that says "Go somewhere else."

I'm starting to get mad.

I see other people and they're milling about. No one can answer my question. There's no sign that says "Peter Pan Bus Gates Here." Nothing on my ticket.

I'm thinking to myself, "Self... there aren't that many people around, we can't really follow a crowd. Let's go downstairs, see if there's anyone down there."

So, I go downstairs. A lone guy, with no affiliation to the Port Authority says "Washington?"

"Uh, yeah."

"Gate 71. Down there."

"Ok. I'm gonna get a danish."

"Yeah, man."

Au Bon Pain did not have any danish. Bastards.

So I head to gate 71. And there's a line.

Now, when you think of a line, you think movie theater line, or maybe even a line outside that club you want to get into, right?

This line was crazy. It spread out all the way down in the basement of Port Authority. It snaked around columns, followed long corridors, down short hallways, and ended with a bunch of people who were turning the end of the line into... wait for it... LEGENDARY.

No, I mean a circle. They were curling the end of the line. It was full on retarded.

Now, I don't like to meddle. Or maybe I do, because I think of myself as a problem solver. Or an elitist. I'm not sure where the distinction lies. Or not. Or whatever.

So, I go and talk to some PA guy and tell him what's happening. Instead of actually doing something about it, he looks, smiles like an idiot, and goes back to talking to his friend.

I walk back grumbling about "I'll show you..." and tell the people behind me that maybe they should, you know, in the interest of sanity, start curling the line so that it doesn't move in a circle. This woman, wearing a Viking hat says "Dude, take it easy, it's just a $30 ticket to Washington."

At this point, I took the war helmet and bashed her brains in. In my mind.

What I actually did was nothing, and I said "Hey, I just think that people are going to start getting angry, and you have an opportunity to start pointing the line in a good position. But, whatever."

Since her group were behind me, they were at a point where they could move the line, because of a structure they were next to. Alas they did not. So, for the next half an hour, while the line grew, it spiraled and continued to spiral, until there were two lines in a tight space. I decided, then and there, that I would not help save the human race from any asteroid strike in the future.

The line, which I have some footage of, was over 1,000 people, easy, and doubled back to the front of the line and then split off. That was AFTER they'd already filled more than ten buses.

It was unreal.

When I finally did get on a bus, it was 7:20, and we were on our way. I sat, for the first two hours... well, the whole way, actually... with a hardened plastic seat belt lock in my left ass cheek, pain in my left leg, and a seat companion who would turn around, get up on her knees, and talk to the people behind us.

By the time we got to the rest stop, we were on time. By the time we left the rest stop, we were 10 minutes late. By the time we reached Maryland we were an hour and a half late. We made it to DC at 12:45pm, five and a half hours after we left.

I wanted to die.

Quick update

Well, I just bought a Kodak Playsport compact camcorder for the trip this weekend. I plan on putting together a video of my trip, meeting people etc. Should be great.

I'm gearing up for this weekend. Just got my box of soaps from Florida, and the whole apartment smells like apple pie. Yummm.

Let's see. The UK site is almost finished. That's fantastic news.

I leave 6:30am on Saturday morning and get into DC around 11:00. I hope I get a good view of the show. I'm very much looking forward to the Reddit after party. That will be a lot of fun, and a relief. I'll be able to give out most of the samples by then. Whew. Lugging around 30lbs of soap is going to make for a tiring day.

My trip to Florida was moderately successful. We made a ton of soap, getting ready for the holiday season. I'm very excited to see what the next two months bring!

If you are going to the rally, are a redditor, and want a sample of our Soapert soaps, look for the tall blonde guy in the 8-Bit Reddit shirt. He's devilishly handsome (ehhhhh), in fantastic shape (oh, for God sake), and oozes charisma.

That last part is true. Ish.

See you in two days!

Soapier's Big Announcement

Yay!

So, about two or three weeks ago, or more, I can't remember, I decided to take over the business.

So, I post on Reddit. Anyone who gets us a wholesale account, they will receive a $30 gift certificate to Soapier.com.

Well, I get an email from a lovely woman, Erica, in the UK, asking about franchise opportunities, or a wholesale agreement. We chat back and forth a bit, and, lo and behold...

Soapier UK is born!

Now, I won't get into the particulars, about cost, shipping, UK taxes, etc... but we both did everything we could to keep costs down so that our European customers will be saving money, purchasing Soapier products.

She is also selling our Reddit Alien and envelope soaps, along with Trollface soaps!

As of right now, we're selling our best sellers from the US in the UK. As time progresses, we'll be bringing over more product.

We're working out some logistic issues with the shopping cart right now, but Erica is taking pre-orders and will start shipping December 1, in plenty of time for the holidays!

So, that's awesome.

Soapier goes to Washington, DC

Well, it's just about a week away. The Rally to Restore Sanity, and Soapier will be there, hanging out with the Reddit crowd, and the rest of the country!

Should be a lot of fun. I'm hoping to take video, do a little montage of my trip...

AND, I'll be bringing down a couple of goodies, as mementos. Check it out. They're called Soapert:



You know, for Colbert? And the best thing is, it smells like apple pie.

My friend Nicole, who has her own pretty awesome blog, Thrift Store Confidential, gave me this idea. Thanks Nicole!

Anyway, if you see me down there (I'll be wearing a Reddit shirt, at the Reddit After-Party, smelling like soap) I might be able to give you one! I can only bring about 50 or so... they're heavy.

See you in Washington!

John

Aid for Aidan

A family put a young boy's artwork up on etsy.com to raise money for his leukemia treatments.

Thanks to Aidan, Soapier has a new mascot!



The prints are $12.00, and go to a good cause. Yesterday, when I purchased, there had been 90 sales. Today, it's at 480, and they had to stop selling because they have so many orders. That's awesome.

Good going Reddit!

Exhaustion, and looking ahead

Well, I've been here a total of five days, and let me tell you brother, my 60-some-odd year old mother is running rings around me.

I would venture that she's working harder at her job than most people do. Clearly that might be an exaggeration, but it can't be that far off base.

Let me see if I can break this down for you.

At present, we sell:

34 different soaps by the slice

6 different goat's milk soaps

6 different Soapier accent soaps

5 different soap slices in mens fragrances

3 different kinds of Reddit Alien soap

2 different Reddit Envelope Soaps

1 Trollface soap

We offer more than 40 different Soapier Samples

We have 6 different gift baskets for the holidays

3 different Soap of the Month Club options

8 different holiday soaps

and a set of Animal Cracker soaps for kids.

One woman, over the past four months, has been busting her ass to make all of this soap for our customers. My sister had been helping, but the business couldn't sustain her salary, so she had to quit. It wasn't an easy decision.

To be clear, if I had six months, I still wouldn't know everything about this business.

I've sat here... well, not really sat. I've walked around this apartment, and I've done my share of making soap, but there is no business without my mom.

Let me tell you what needs to happen, for Soapier to continue.

First off, we need orders. Now, I have some very, very good news that I'm going to spill on Thursday. This might be exactly what Soapier needs, to generate orders... we also have the holiday season fast approaching, and also the Reddit Secret Santa. Should be awesome.

We have two different venues for advertising this holiday season. I'm optimistic.

Second, we need to hire someone.

Third, we need a production facility.

Now, 'production facility' is just a fancy term for warehouse space. I like to call it a production facility because, well, that's what we do there. We produce a product.

The second and third things that we need are tied to us getting sales. We need to generate X amount this holiday season to allow us to hire someone and move our soap making out of my mom's house and into a space that is dedicated to one thing.

Clearly, moving our soap making business is not possible between now and the holidays. Not unless we received $10,000 in orders over the next two weeks. Hell, that would pay for a space AND a full time person for the next five months, at least. But I'm not holding my breath.

One of the things I've been looking into is Kickstarter.com. I want to put up a fundraising campaign, offering our Soap of the Month Club as incentive. We'll see if it happens.

Other than that... right now, it's a waiting game. We have to see how November sales are. Which kind of sucks, because November of last year was a busy month for us. It's one of the main reasons I'm down in Florida right now. We're making as much soap as we can, so that when the orders do start coming in, we can get them out without having to stop everything, just to make a loaf of soap.

Tomorrow, we put in a big order for soap base. We put in an order for some extra molds, a new mold for shaving soap (we've been getting plenty of requests), and some fragrances.

Then it's Keep on Truckin', making soap, wrapping it, labeling it, and storing it for the rush.

If you had a good relationship with your mother when you were younger, then the amount of respect you had for her will change, as you grow older. It might go lower... that's probably when you come to see some things about her, as an adult, that you might not agree with, and what have you. I hope that's rare.

Or, it might go higher.

For me, it's clearly gone higher. I've seen my mom fight her way through some personal issues, over the last five years or so, that would affect others in a much worse way, and come out damaged on the other side. Clearly, my mom can be defined as a fighter. She has high standards for things that actually matter, and it's one of the reasons this business has done as well as it has, this past year.

So, to all of you who are fans of our soap, your thanks should go directly to Linda. She's the driving force behind this company, and I'm going to do all I can to take the burden off of her shoulders.

We'll see how Soapier fares after this holiday season. I think that, at some point, I'll have some wonderful news for you, in the realm of our growing business.