By Aimee Chiavaroli
The Standard-Times, New Bedford, Mass.
WWR Article Summary (tl;dr) An amazing nine year old Massachusetts girl has her own bath bomb business! She promotes her bath products through an Instagram page and a YouTube channel under the name Hannah Grace BeYOUtiful.
NEW BEDFORD
Hannah Grace Walsh, donning a light pink sweater and a pink bow Sunday used her hands to mix ingredients for one of her new bath bombs called birthday cake.
“My dad thought I could make these and it worked,” she said.
Hannah is nine years old and promotes her products through an Instagram page and a YouTube channel under the name Hannah Grace BeYOUtiful. The mixture of essential oils, baking soda and a few other ingredients is packed into a mold and dried. The resulting ball fizzes and dissolves when put into water.
Hannah added purple, blue, red and green salt dyed with food coloring to give the effect of sprinkles on the bath bomb. The scent of vanilla filled the air in the kitchen, which turned into her workshop.
Asked about her favorite part of the process, Hannah said “When we get to mold them.” She hand-packed the mixture into three round molds.
Hannah admitted she doesn’t do it all on her own, but “I have help from my family.” That could be helping to shoot videos with her iPad or helping to decide what scents should be combined for a product.
“It’s a family thing,” said Grace, Hannah’s mother. She said her son John, 12, also helps out.
She might need the help after Grace’s co-worker requested an order of 50 bath bombs for a bridal shower, but they may not need to be finished until June.
Hannah’s products are available at Elements of Style salon on Hemlock Street and Hippo on Purchase Street.
“We were just really impressed with her coming into the store” and explaining her products, said Shelley Cardoos, owner of Hippo which has hand-made and primarily local products.
She said Hannah made samples for her and the store manager.
“I did try the bath bomb and it’s excellent,” she said. It was grapefruit and lime scented called refreshing.
And it’s not just Cardoos who likes them. “They’re really selling well,” she said. “She’s had to come in several times to replenish.”
Cardoos, also the executive director of SouthCoast Entrepreneurship for All, described Hannah’s bath bombs as “really good products.” She admitted she doesn’t usually take baths, but said the experience was “very relaxing.”
They take about 30 to 40 minutes to put together, Hannah said, and are usually left to dry overnight.
One friend, Madeleine Cabral, 9, said she tried a bath bomb called paradise which she likened to a “Hawaiian smell,” noting it was a strong, flowery aroma.
Asked about her favorite part of having her YouTube channel, Hannah said, “that I get to test them out in the bath and show everyone.” She has used a GoPro camera to show the bath bomb dissolving under water.
In her latest video, she tests a bath bomb that has a hidden trinket inside. She said her younger cousins don’t like to take baths and her creation might help with that.
While Kenneth said the bath bombs are fairly easy to make, it has been a bit of a process to get just the right balance of dry and wet ingredients.
“It’s been a lot of trial and error,” he said. “The ones that don’t get to work out so well, we get to use them.”
While she’s only been making the bath bombs for the last three to four weeks, her business might be expanding into soap.
She had a sample of a green bar she cut in half that was like Play-Doh. It could be molded into different shapes and be used to wash hands.
Cabral tried it out in the sink. “It’s still in process,” she said.
