Bath bomb company expands operations from house to Tacoma retail store

From the sprinkles to the industrial mixer to the cooling racks inside Feeling Smitten, it’s not surprising people mistake it for a bakery.

Through the windows, cupcake icing beckons, and the doughnuts and ice cream cones look real enough to eat.

“We’re out here to fool you,” said Katy Probst, a Smitten employee and childhood friend of company founder Courtney Stephens. But these goodies are meant to land in your bathtub, not your stomach.

Feeling Smitten’s tiny retail store at 2503 Sixth Avenue masks a large wholesale operation. Just four years ago, Stephens started her business in her Lakewood home. Now the Lakes High School graduate and her eight employees hand-produce about 2,500 food-inspired bath pieces each day and ship to more than 750 retailers across the globe.

Stephens’ company makes bath bombs: a variety of salt, essential oil and other bath products crunched into a solid ball, which fizzes once dropped it into water. They’re intended to relax the body, and to exfoliate and moisturize skin.

The business ships bath bombs mostly in the United States but also mails them to about 40 retailers outside the country, including Germany, Belgium, Holland, Canada and Mexico.

Stephens, 31, started Feeling Smitten in February 2007. She graduated from the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York in 2006.

She said she thought she wanted to be a fashion buyer, but she saw cupcake-shaped bath bombs and knew she could make them look more realistic.

“I enjoy this much more than working in the fashion industry,” she said, and the skills she learned about fashion, including color and design, align with her business decisions.

Stephens said she always wanted to have a business and call it “Smitten” – no deep meaning there, she said, other than she liked the word. She added “Feeling” when it was clear her business would sell bath products.

“It’s how we want you to feel when you use our products,” Stephens said.

CUPCAKES AND CHAOS

For the first four years, Stephens ran and operated Feeling Smitten out of her home. Probst, who has been friends with Stephens since the sixth grade at Lake City Elementary School, remembers the chaos.

Probst, 29, said Stephens would stay up until 2 a.m. making the cupcake bath bombs and wake up at 6 a.m. to ice them. She said Stephens would ice so many cupcakes, she ran out of strength to squeeze a toothpaste tube.

“The UPS and FedEx people always said how great the house smelled,” Stephens said. “There was lots of glitter everywhere.”

After five months of hard work, Stephens hired Colorado-based JC Beauty Group in November 2007 to handle wholesales.

Lindsey Hirni, a co-owner of JC Beauty Group, said that she was doing a Google search to find a client who made bath soap or bath bombs to round out their luxury beauty product offerings.

Hirni stumbled upon Feeling Smitten and said she knew the business would be a hit. Hirni said she thought cupcakes were a really cute idea. “The quality of the products makes them really special,” Hirni said. “They hand-make everything. People like it when things are handmade.”

“I didn’t even have to see them in person to know they’d do well,” she said. “We started working with (Stepens) and right away we got a tremendous response.

“They hand-make everything and they’re not mass-producing,” Hirni said. “That makes them really special.”

While other companies use machines to make thousands of items, “we’re the machines,” Probst said.

Plus, Smitten products are made with 98 percent natural ingredients. Sulfate and paraben, chemicals commonly used to make beauty products, are nowhere to be found in Smitten products. Parabens are preservatives, and sulfates are soaping agents. Both are too harsh for Smitten products, Stephens said. “They don’t have any of the nasties in them,” Stephens said.

Before the partnership, Stephens said she had sold to about 12 retailers. Within a month, Hirni said she brought Stephens 50 new accounts.

“Our customers can’t get enough,” Hirni said. “They fly off the shelf.”

JC Beauty Group also has placed Stephens’ products with high-end accounts, such as MGM, Monte Carlo, Marriott and Hilton hotels, Henri Bendel in New York and Disney. Smitten products can be found at spas and gift stores in hotels.

Hirni said the feedback they’ve gotten for Feeling Smitten has been “overwhelmingly positive.” Of their seven clients, Hirni said Feeling Smitten is their top seller.

MOVE TO SIXTH AVENUE

In March, Stephens moved into the 1,500-square-foot location in the Sixth Avenue business district and carved out a tiny retail space in front of their bath bomb bakery. Stephens said she looked at different places in Tacoma, such as the Proctor District and downtown, but she said Sixth Avenue was the best fit for what she wanted.

“I really liked our landlord,” Stephens said. “It helps when you have positive people around you. I’m really glad we’re on Sixth Ave. It’s fun.”

David Printz, president of the Sixth Avenue Business District Association, said the group is thrilled Stephens chose the location for the shop.

“They are good business owners and managers,” Printz said. “They figured out a unique way to package and sell their products.”

Stephens said retail sales from the storefront are about 10 percent to 15 percent of their overall sales, though she wouldn’t disclose hard numbers. She said the company has grown each year.

Probst said Feeling Smitten has at least doubled its sales each year and has an 80 percent reorder rate for its wholesale customers. Hirni of JC Beauty Group said Smitten added 200 new accounts in the past year alone.

The bath bombs retail between $4 and $12 each. Wholesale customers get a bulk discount of about 50 percent.

The business’s only advertising is on Facebook and at gift shows. That goes against a traditional business model, Stephens said, but it’s working.

“We didn’t really know what to expect,” she said. “We celebrate as everything happens.”

FAMILY AFFAIR

Feeling Smitten is full of family connections. Stephens’ mother, Ali Pearson, was an entrepreneur whose businesses ranged from making lamp shades to cutting hair. Pearson now lives in North Carolina but bakes bath bombs for her daughter’s business. She ships about 80 percent of the miniature bath bomb bases to the Tacoma store, where they’re iced, sprinkled and packaged.

“If she weren’t to do it, I’d have to hire a full-time person,” Stephens said.

Credit for the icing creation goes to Stephens’ sister, Candace Pearson. Her training at the Institute of Culinary Education in New York has underpinned her creative efforts.

“We kind of just stick Candace in her little production corner and say, ‘let her do her own thing,’ ” Probst said.

Stephens’ creative outlet is in finding new scents and product ideas.

Now she’s working on malt shake shower products.

“I’ll spend some time in here when nobody’s here,” Stephens said.

Ian Stephens, Courtney’s husband, started working at Feeling Smitten about a year ago. The two married in Hawaii in June. Ian said he was supposed to help only for a month.

“It’s been a long month,” he said, while emphasizing he enjoys it.

THE FUTURE

Big things could be in store for Feeling Smitten. Ian Stephens said they’ve been approached to film a reality show in the bath bomb bakery, though they turned them down.

Courtney Stephens said large retailers such as Forever 21 want to sell Smitten products, but in quantities so large that mass production would be required. Stephens isn’t willing to sacrifice quality, so they were turned down, too.

“In Pierce County there are a lot of companies that aren’t on the radar because they’re not huge, and this is one of those,” said Bruce Kendall, president and CEO of the Economic Development Board for Tacoma-Pierce County. “But it’s always exciting to see companies emerge and make a go of it internationally and domestically.”

Meanwhile the products are a hit with the store’s neighbors.

Cortney Young, owner of Polished Nail Salon just upstairs from the bakery, said she started using Feeling Smitten products on customers a few months ago.

“Not only are they pretty and smell good, but they use great ingredients,” Young said.

“It’s nice to have a business have healthy things right under our shop.”

Stephanie Kim: 253-597-8692

stephanie.kim@thenewstribune.com