Escentials — as nature would have it

SANDY — It started as a hobby, a way to earn a little extra money to help pay the bills and keep a stay-at-home mom busy.

However, for Hillary Gepkens, selling products made of goat's milk has now turned into a full-fledged business called Energizing Escentials.

Gepkens sells 25 different varieties of all-natural soaps and lotions made from goat's milk at Farmer's Market in Pioneer Park and at arts and crafts shows around the Wasatch Front. She loves the different venues where she sells her products, Gepkens said.

"First of all (I just love) the locations in which we sell. We go to Bear Lake for Raspberry Days, Midway for Swiss Days, Moab for the arts festival, and that's the best part," she said.

Gepkens started using goat's milk soap when she discovered in her teenage years that she is allergic to everything else. After she got married, her husband wondered why they were spending so much on soap every month, so Gepkens decided to learn how to make it herself. She bought a make-your-own soap kit from a health food store online and decided to experiment.

The result was a soap tailored just for her with ingredients such as extra virgin coconut oil and shea butter, both of which are good for the skin.

"Over time it's just evolved into something I'm really proud of," she said.

At the time she started making the soaps she was working full-time, so it was just a hobby. However, after she became a stay-at-home mom, she started making the soaps to give away as gifts for neighbors and friends. Custom orders for soaps to match someone's kitchen or bathroom started coming in so quickly that Gepkens was losing money, and Energizing Escentials was born.

Gepkens started out small, with five scents, and now her collection boasts 25, many of them original combinations. Her best seller by far, she says, is called Rise and Shine. It is the first combination she came up with and includes orange, apple, grapefruit, peach and strawberry with just a touch of loganberry.

Most of the scent combinations she discovers by experimenting, Gepkens said.

"I spend whole days playing around," she said. "My husband says, 'Let's try this combination,' such as lavender and mint, and we just play."

Sometimes combinations work out, and sometimes they don't. Once Gepkens wanted a pine-scented soap and ended up with something that smelled like Pine-Sol. Other odd mixtures like lavender and spearmint or grapefruit and vanilla turn out to be best sellers.