Lela Barker
Ten years ago, Lela Barker was a broke and broken single mother living in her parent’s spare bedroom. Today, she’s the creator + CEO of Bella Lucce (an award-winning, international beauty company), the executive director of a Moroccan-based nonprofit and president of Lucky Break, a small business consulting firm serving the creative community. Lela’s expertise lies in distilling complicated business concepts down to their essence. Her books, live events, mentoring programs and digital workshops are packed with practical wisdom and actionable steps to get makers and creatives moving in the right direction. Lela’s signature teachings revolve around product pricing for makers and cracking the wholesale market.
Lela has been honored to speak at business conferences and industry events from Palm Springs, California to Bamako, Mali. She’s taught on cruise ships, in African mud huts and in swanky hotel ballrooms. Her love of travel has brought her to more than thirty countries to source exotic ingredients, teach small business and product formulation workshops, and share her passion with moguls-in-the-making around the globe. Lela has consulted for USAID and sits on the executive board of Bead For Life, a nonprofit working to empower women and combat extreme poverty
in Uganda. Her products and personal story have been featured in more than fifty publications worldwide.
Lela believes in girl power, second chances, fab shoes and dark chocolate. She lives in in Columbia, SC with her two teen daughters and her high school sweetheart (it’s a great story!)
- Kenna Cote
Kendra Cote, known as Kenna by fellow soapcrafters, started soaping in 2004 and spent many years honing her techniques, formulas, and knowledge. In 2008, Kenna attended cosmetology school, which fueled her interest in the chemistry behind beauty, eventually leading to the day her vegan bath & body company was created in 2011.
Finding immense passion and joy in combining aesthetics and function in cold process soap making, she specializes in complex design/coloring techniques. Kenna is the author of various soapmaking ebooks, blogs, and articles. She hosts the annual Central Soapers Workshop in Kansas City, and teaches soap crafting, both locally and online, while growing her own soap company, Amathia Soapworks.
We hope you will come and join us at the 16th annual Alabama Soap & Candle Association Meeting that will be held at the Doster Center in Historic Downtown Prattville, Alabama! We have a link to the Rand-McNally website that will give you step by step directions to the meeting location when you provide your starting point.
The Alabama Soap and Candle Association began as the Alabama Soap Meeting in 1998 with 4 members, and has grown to well over 100 members. Join our Yahoo Group to keep up with activities like monthly luncheons, our winter gathering, and more.
We promise fun, fellowship, food, my three favorite “f’s”!, education, and some awesome shopping opportunities. There will be several vendors there from whom you can buy on the spot, and many of our generous sponsors will provide samples of new products so we can try before we buy. Put this event on your calendar now…. it’ll be the *must attend* event of the Summer of 2014! There are always several swaps in which you can participate. We promise you two fun-filled days of amazing speakers and demos. We have had amazingly generous sponsors who provide items for door prizes and for our goodie bags. I’m sure that they will be even more generous in 2014. Some of our vendors may offer specials such as free delivery to the meeting.
We’d love to see you there! Make plans now to be there, Friday, June 6th and Saturday, June 7th, 2014. Early-Bird Registration ends March 31! REGULAR REGISTRATION ENDS MAY 31!!
