Small Business Spotlight: Florapothecarie

MIDDLETOWN, CT (WFSB) - Beautiful ingredients that make beautiful skin is what Sami Jo Artus creates with Florapothecarie.

“I love the word apothecary and I wanted also to convey that my products are 100 percent natural. I use flowers and essential oils and floral based ingredients in everything that I make, so I just kind of merged them together, and that’s where I got Florapothecarie,” said Artus.

She started out just making skin care products, and officially launched Florapothecarie in 2016.

“I’m actually Leaping Bunny and PETA certified as vegan and cruelty free. So I started with facial cleansers, a toner, a facial serum that’s kind of like my three-step daily system and it really grew from there to pretty much anything that you would want to use on like a good day of self-care,” Artus said.

Since then, she’s added lots of other products, like body scrubs, bath salts, coconut milk baths, teas, masks, candles, and even beard oils.

“Probably my number one best seller is my deodorant cream, it’s kind of a tie between I have an original formula with baking soda and then I have a baking soda free one,” said Artus.

Most of her products are lightly scented. Lavender and rose are some of the most popular.

“I aim to make products that anyone can use but obviously everybody is different. So you may have an allergic reaction even if it is a really natural, good ingredient, like an almond oil or something, which I actually don’t use in my products so many people have nut allergies. But so I try to use hypoallergenic ingredients and like I said I use essential oils rather than man-made fragrance oils,” Artus said.

Artus makes most of her products right in her home, but she’s hoping to change that.

“Interestingly enough I used to have a small studio and I moved out of it because of the pandemic, which was a little bit rough of course, and mostly my business has been home based, and I kind of took a risk in taking on a studio space but didn’t really work out. And that’s ok. So I’d like to do that again,” Artus said.

For more information on Florapothecarie, click here.

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