Naughtons Skincare was founded in April 2019 by Alexandra Naughton and within three months she had her luxurious, cold process, coconut soaps in a shop, in Clevedon. Such was their success, that said shop have now taken her full range of fabulous, hand poured, soy wax candles, her bath bombs and accessories. She is also………drumroll………supplying a company in New York!
Was I surprised? No! Alex is an extremely hard working individual with a real head for business, who is passionate about all things botanical. Her passion grew into wanting to know more about the properties of plants and how to incorporate these into a skin care range.
She had previously bought products that listed ingredients that she couldn’t even pronounce as well as top end products, hoping that they’d hold up to their promises.
Her aim was to bridge the gap between these two types of product and offer natural skincare, with honest ingredients at an accessible price point.
The timing of her business launch was perfect; she hit the market at a time when sustainable beauty and wellbeing moved into the mainstream. Consumers want to buy certified, organic, sustainable products that they can trust and that is exactly what Alex offers:
“We pride ourselves in using natural and responsibly sourced ingredients with some even being grown locally in our home town, meaning they are fresh and perfectly balanced for even sensitive skin”
I can certainly testify to the provenance of many of Alex’s ingredients because our allotment plots are adjacent to each other. The reason I describe her as very hard working is because I have seen her in action at the allotment where she is often to be found with her two lovely boys aged seven and four.
Naughtons’s Skincare is a far cry from her other part time job which is working in admin and accounts and I was curious as to how this very different business had started out and developed.
Alex said she was always a creative individual and her love of crafts, her passion for growing things and a well-developed sense of environmental awareness led her to a melt and pour soap class which inspired her to want to develop the necessary skills to produce her own range.
After months of instruction and self-teaching; researching into the health properties of the natural ingredients she was planning to use; experimenting with these; trialling a variety of recipes; Alex started to test her soaps on friends and family until she came up with a product that she felt was marketable. She has not looked back!
Alex was very keen for me to know about the integrity of her range and I had to agree it is sometimes very difficult to decipher exactly what a product contains. She explained that legally you have to include the Latin name of ingredients but she also includes the English equivalent so that people know exactly what they are getting.
What they are getting with Naughtons Skincare are natural, organic skin care products laden with antioxidants and anti-inflammatories which stimulate the natural defence mechanisms of your skin and support the skin’s natural functions and regenerative healing process. All with the added bonus of being very affordable and knowing that you are being kind to the environment.
The large cleansing soaps that Alex has created come in six beautiful scents: peppermint and poppy, sea salt and sage, kaolin and lavender, lemon and poppy, coconut and tea tree and sweet orange and olive.
The delicious bath bombs are scented with lemongrass and mandarin, ylang ylang and ginger, chamomile and grapefruit, rosemary and thyme and frankincense and rose.
Her definition candles which are the latest addition to Alex’s range are individually hand poured using vegan friendly, soy wax and scented with a sour sweet high quality wild rhubarb fragrance oil. They make a great present because they are sold in a luxury textured box. There are a choice of eight definitions: Mumster Ginvincinble, Gincident, Fizzicality, Bae, Fit Shaced, Hoffsyndrome and Flawsome.
There are other lovely products on Alex’s very user friendly website that you can check out here:https://www.naughtonskincare.com/shop-1
Another very welcome aspect of the website are the blog posts which are short, informative, interesting and very useful. My favourite one was all about the Konjac plant which I had never heard of. It’s grown in the tropical to subtropical regions of East Asia, and has been used in Korea, Japan and China for over 1,500 years as medicine, food, a dieting aid and a beauty product. The sponges have a wealth of benefits to your skin and are a perfect complement to Alex’s coconut soap range and brand.
I loved chatting to Alex about her business which I am sure will go from strength to strength. Currently, her main source of buyers are wholesale and through the website. She does very few fairs which is hardly surprising given her other work commitments and her young family. She’s promised to let me know if this changes and I’ll let you know on my FaceBook page: @FACESofClevedon, Twitter: @facesofclevedon, or Instagram: @facesofclevedon
All the best for continued growth and success.