And Fortnum & Mason – the famous 300-year-old London department store – is going to launch our probiotic skin care!
After the Daily Mail rated our oatmeal and honey soap nine out of 10, I plucked up my courage and sent the article to the most prestigious stores in the UK: Harrods, Selfridges and Fortnum & Mason. Straight for the top, I reasoned. It’s a crazy shot in the dark anyhow, so why not?
But then Elizabeth Cook, the new buyer who’d just taken control of the Bath and Beauty department at Fortnum’s, phoned me out of the blue. It seemed that she loved our products, and would like to stock our line. (As if we had a ‘line’. Hah!) Could I come to London for a meeting to discuss?
By the strangest coincidence, I was on a train into London at the very moment I received the call. I was taking Joli in to put her on the plane to go and see her American relatives, as she does every summer.
I texted back that I could indeed make the meeting, and it was arranged for the next day, after I’d put Joli on the plane. I always take Joli a day early, and we stay in a hotel overnight and see a West End show. It’s become a tradition – a way of coping with the grim reality of the six-hour train trip, and also to buffer the sadness of Joli going away for an entire month.
I told Joli what had just happened, and we held hands and bounced up and down in our seats, screaming soundlessly for a few minutes. Then I sat back and started to think feverishly. No appropriate clothes for a meeting at Fortnum & Mason, no soap samples with me, no time to ring Rich and have him ship samples by next day post, as it was already late afternoon. How the hell was I going to pull this off?
But I wasn’t going to miss this meeting. It would be months before I could justify the expense of another trip into London, and even one day away from Rich, leaving the weight of the farm on his shoulders, was too much.
That evening, Joli and I went to see Jersey Boys, which we adored. I put her on the plane the next day, and clung to her before that horrible moment where she disappeared off through security, accompanied by the Virgin Atlantic representative. The airline has a great system in place for flying unaccompanied minors – you check the young people in at one end, and only a designated person with photo ID can collect them at the other end. A Virgin rep actually flies with them. Joli’s been doing it since she was small, and she loves it.
So I watched her go, and cried, and then went to buy myself the traditional post-goodbye Krispy Kreme.
I had a problem. A meeting at Fortnum & Mason in six hours’ time, to pitch a skincare line that didn’t exist, and no samples. What do I always turn to in a crisis? Research.
I raced over to the pay-as-you-go computer terminals and feverishly plugged in my credit card. Not even sure what I was looking for. Natural skin care, natural health – maybe a spa?
I found something on the first page, a natural skincare line that used aromatherapy oils. Bingo. I use aromatherapy oils, too. But I have something they don’t have – goat’s milk. And now, after my experience with Rich, I know something else – kefir is magic for the skin. My magic ingredient.
I noted the address of the spa and set out on the Tube. Two hours later, I walked into the tiny spa, bought a sample bag of their products, turned around and walked out. Back onto the Tube. At Fortnum & Mason in Piccadilly, I allowed the doorman to swing open the massive mahogany and brass door, and told him (rather grandly) that I had a meeting there. He looked at me doubtfully, but let me in.
I walked up the red-carpeted staircase, past the intimidating oil paintings on the walls, and sat in the velvet wing chair placed there for visitors like myself. I wasn’t wearing high heels and a suit, true, but my travel clothes would have to do.
When I was finally called into the meeting room, it looked like a newspaper office – terminals everywhere and people busily rushing around. Elizabeth Cook was young and charming and shook my hand enthusiastically.
I put my bag of purchased samples (beautifully wrapped, thank goodness!) down on the table in front of her.
‘Everything they can do, we can do better,’ I said, with confidence that I didn’t feel. ‘They use aromatherapy? We do too. But we have something that they don’t have. Our products have goat’s milk in them – and it’s probiotic.’
‘I’m listening,’ she said.
So I told her the story of Rich, and his close escape, and how I learned to put kefir into soaps and skin creams.
She agreed that Fortnum & Mason would launch our line – of three creams and six soaps! – and I went home on the train floating on a cloud. I treated myself to a first-class ticket, clutching my lucky bag of purchased samples in my hands and refusing to allow myself to get worried about the fact that I’d just sold a line of products that didn’t exist.
Yet.
A big spread about our battle with MRSA came out in The Sun daily newspaper, and we got a lot of publicity. The phone is ringing off the hook, and orders are flying in. NutriCentre in London wants to launch all our products, including the kefir and the coconut kefir. (Which I did, finally, get right!)
So, miracle after miracle.
But, sitting here at the picnic table in the sun, I can see the most important miracle of all. My Rich, in his denim shirt, sunburned and windswept, on his tractor in the field below me. Healthy and strong and alive.
24 July 2013
Silver sun over the sea makes my chest ache, like someone is taking a soup spoon to my ribs.
It’s funny, but in the wake of Fortnum & Mason’s offer to stock our products, Rich and I decided that I should come in from the barn and devote all my time to product development. Or rather, I decided – and announced it – and he agreed. I’m sure that’s how he would describe it, anyway!
We’ve been doing that for a few weeks now, and I must admit that, in the beginning, I loved it. It was luxurious to lie in bed while Rich got up to milk; lovely to have breakfast with Benji and take him to school. I did feel more energetic, I must admit. I did come home from the school run raring to go, whipping up multiple batches of soap before noon.
But…
Today Rich had a doctor’s appointment in the morning, and so I went out to milk as I used to. Pulled on my striped wellies, stomped outside with the beautiful and talented Rosie Kitty – mother of all kittens and true boss of the barn – at my heels. (Rosie Kitty always waits for me at the door to walk me to the barn. There have been only two occasions when she wasn’t there – when she was giving birth to her kittens, and when she was deathly ill. Otherwise, she’s there. Always.)
In the barn, all was just as it used to be. Turn on the water heater, flick on the radio, swing the yellow bucket down and put it under the tap, turn the water to start filling it for later. Fill the food bowls, sling them onto the milking stands, turn on the milking machine, let the first two ladies out of the pen to begin the hour-long dance of goats, milk and machine.
It was all so familiar. And yet I’d been gone for weeks, and it felt strange to be back – the goats looked at me reproachfully, and even Rosie Kitty seemed to be struggling to get back to our old, easy camaraderie. The big lead milker, Juliet, rubbed her head on my sleeve, over and over, and almost wouldn’t let me get up. I saw a few goats with overgrown hooves that needed trimming. Patsy needed worming; I was sure of it. And we’d run out of beet shreds and no-one had replaced them, as it’s usually my job.
I felt sad, and a little hollow, about all these things. I’d missed out on so much, and the life of the barn had carried on without me. Like looking at a child that I’d neglected, I felt guilty.
And then I realized that I need to be out in the barn. The goats need me and I need them. This is what I do; this is what keeps me honest. I could stay inside, and make fancy skin creams for fancy shops, and type on the computer, and it would be like living anywhere. I wouldn’t have my hands on my own lovely goats, or my arms wrapped around this farm. I would be staying here, like a lodger – like the holidaymakers who stay in the cottage. But I wouldn’t be living here.
/> Living, for me, requires a more passionate, energetic involvement. Living here means getting up and getting out into the barn in the early morning and doing the milking. And that’s all there is to it.
So, I may be a little more tired. The products may be developed a little more slowly. And the paperwork may suffer. But the heart of this place is out there, in the barn, with the goats. And that’s where I need to be.
25 July 2013
We’ve come so far in just six months. Now it’s time to pay the piper. It’s all very well coming up with lovely imaginary product lines, but now I’m going to have to produce the actual goods.
And there’s no money to buy the jars and packaging that we need to get everything up to the specification that Fortnum & Mason require. We’re going to have to sell Rich’s motorcycle, and everything else we can lay our hands on – including some of the goats – to raise the cash to buy the jars and bottles for skin cream.
Is this what’s known in business as ‘problems with scaling’? I’ve no idea where the money will come from. I’m just going to have to pull a rabbit out of a hat somewhere. But what kind of rabbit, and which hat, I really couldn’t say. I just refuse to believe that, having accomplished this dream of having a wonderful door open for us, we’re not going to be able to afford to walk through it, for lack of seed money. Something will come along – it must!
We need bar codes… how does one go about getting a bar code? I’ll have to figure this out in the very near future. The designer working on the packaging is waiting to hear, so that he can get the artwork to the printer. The probiotic bottle cleaner man is waiting to hear, so that he can reserve us time in the factory. And not only do I not have a clue what to do, I don’t even know who to ask!
Still, we’ll work it out in the end. We always do. Having survived what we’ve survived, the rest is cake. It feels like our luck has finally turned, even without money.
The weather has been blissfully hot and sunny for week upon week now – Rich says he hasn’t seen anything like it since he was a boy. Blue skies, golden fields… we had the ultimate luxury of getting all the hay in, with time left over to spare.
I have moulds full of pale green tea-tree goat’s milk kefir soap curing on the kitchen table – part of the new probiotic skincare line that we’re creating for Fortnum & Mason. It smells like heaven – sharp and herby, like the goat’s milk soap, but even nicer.
Somehow the goat’s milk kefir just does magic things in the soap. The skin cream works perfectly to cure loads of problems – it seems to work on eczema, psoriasis, rosacea, spots – even cracked heels! We’ve yet to try it on anything that it fails to clear up. This is my favourite bit – the experimenting and making things from the milk the goats give us. And my lovely, brilliant, wonderful mother is helping us with a bridging loan, enough to allow us to buy the jars and bottles and labels we need for the Fortnum & Mason launch. Bless her! Thank goodness for family!
So it’s full speed ahead… We’ve come such a way – such a very, very long way. But we made it through all that darkness, in the end, and that’s what matters. We’re together. Rich is still alive. He’s healthy and strong and back on his tractor. And I’ve learned such a lot. Not lessons I would have volunteered for, certainly. But as a result, magical doors have opened for me that I never imagined to be possible. Truly, I must be the luckiest woman in the world….
Epilogue
Rich pulled his beautifully cut Harris tweed jacket, specially imported from Edinburgh at some trouble and expense, over his carefully ironed, brand new shirt. He tied his silk tie, put on the lovely leather brogues borrowed from his brother Rhys especially for the occasion (having been forbidden his beloved cowboy boots), and scowled at me.
Rich hates dressing up.
But he looked natty, handsome and exactly what he was – a prosperous Welsh farmer going to meet HRH The Prince of Wales.
I scrambled into my own hastily assembled outfit. Black jacket and trousers, silk blouse, pearl earrings – the goats wouldn’t recognize me! And then we were off.
In the car on the way, I pored over the list of etiquette do’s and don’ts for meeting royalty – as an American, I’d never really considered the ins and outs of curtsying while wearing trousers. Wait for HRH to speak first. Don’t offer to shake hands unless he initiates it. Your Royal Highness is the preferred address the first time, and Sir thereafter. And, most important of all, no inappropriate jokes or remarks about other members of the royal family. Hmmm…
I sighed and looked sideways at Rich, who was driving grimly and staring straight ahead, wearing his Braveheart face. I supposed I was lucky, really, that he wasn’t showing up wearing skins, with blue streaks painted across his cheekbones. As a patriotic Welshman, it was a stretch for him even to consent to show up today to chitchat with English royalty. I’d no hopes whatsoever of getting him to bow.
But I had no such scruples! I was just plain excited. We’d been contacted by the Cambrian Mountain Initiative, an organization inspired by the Prince to promote rural products. We’ve been to a couple of meetings, and now we’d been offered this chance to meet HRH.
I didn’t really know what to think about it, to be honest. The chance of actually getting to talk with the Prince himself seemed pretty remote. But at the very least, I thought, I’ll be in the same room as him, and I suppose that’s something that not many people can say!
When we arrived at the Y Talbot Hotel in Tregaron, West Wales, we could see police ringing the building, and dressed-up members of the group were beginning to drift through the doors. We parked the car, found an entrance and joined the swarm of about 50 nervous people. There was a buffet lunch – I tried to avoid anything that might drip onto my shirtfront – and a business meeting first: slides and explanations of what would happen with the group in the upcoming year.
We’d brought a sample bag of our Chuckling Goat raw goat’s milk soap for HRH, without any real hope that we’d be allowed to give it to him. Surely security concerns would forbid such things? But when I asked the lady who’d organized the day whether it was possible, she said to go ahead, that people quite often gave things to the Prince. (Another thing we discovered – never say, ‘he’ or ‘him’. And apparently it’s terrible vulgar to use first names – ‘Prince Charles’ is completely out of the question!)
Then a buzz started going around the room that HRH was on his way. Someone asked us to get to our feet and stand near the door. We were arranged in groups according to farming interest – the butchers all in one group, small producers in another.
As we make soap (non-edibles) we were put together with a lady who makes wool. We were told not to move, but not to look as though we were standing waiting, either. We tried our best to accommodate these conflicting directions. A gentleman in an extremely well-cut suit came around and said politely, ‘His Royal Highness will be holding a cup of tea, but he won’t drink from it unless you are also holding one. So may I suggest that you get yourself a cup of tea?’
As this was clearly more than just a suggestion, I did as I was told. Rich doesn’t drink tea, and in full rebel mode now, flatly refused to get one. I began to panic. There were too many things to hold – how was I going to manage a cup and saucer and a sample bag of soap, plus curtsy, shake hands (don’t initiate hand shaking, but be ready to respond if HRH seems to want to shake your hand), and remember everything else? I shoved the sample bag into Rich’s hand, and prayed I wouldn’t spill tea all over myself and HRH.
I muttered to the wool lady standing next to us that HRH must think that everyone in the world has sweaty palms – I certainly did!
Finally, The Person In Question came into the room. Contrary to the impression I had from seeing him on television, where he appears tall and austere, HRH is charismatic, charming and very warm. It was strange, finally seeing a face in person that you’ve seen so many times in print and on screen.
HRH spoke to the butchers’ groups next to us for a long time, while we f
idgeted and tried not to stare or eavesdrop. When he finally moved on to us, he was warm and pleasant, leaning forwards into the conversation, his voice pitched low and casual. I managed to curtsy and say, ‘Your Royal Highness’. Unsurprisingly, Rich didn’t bow or bend the knee. Half horrified and half quite proud of him, I hoped no-one would come and drag him off for committing treason.
‘Have you come far today?’ HRH asked. (I smiled to myself – he had no idea how far we’d really come. Or the adventures we’d survived along the way!) He looked at my name badge, probing for a hint of who we were, a suggestion for the next topic. What a burden, to lead conversations with 50 overawed, nervous strangers! I didn’t envy his job at that moment.
Our name badges identified us as ‘Chuckling Goat’. HRH seized on the clue. ‘And what do you do with the goats?’ he asked. ‘Well, Your Royal Highness, now there’s a leading question,’ Rich said. I held my breath – no impertinent remarks! But HRH laughed, and it was all right after that.
We gave him the soap, which was handed back to the private secretary hovering behind the royal shoulder, and he asked all about it, with what seemed like genuine interest. ‘Tell me, does it also cure wrinkles?’ he asked.
‘Well,’ Rich said, ‘my wife here is really 93 years old!’ (Luckily I’m still just young enough for that to be funny!)
We chatted for what seemed like a long time, but was in reality probably five or six minutes, and then HRH smiled and thanked us and moved gracefully on.
Later we got a lovely letter from HRH’s private secretary, thanking us for the ‘gift of Chuckling Goat toiletries’ and saying that they had been ‘safely transported’ to the Prince’s Welsh home at Llwynywermod, just outside Brecon Beacons National Park, where they ‘will be greatly enjoyed’.
Secrets from Chuckling Goat Page 21