What a Year!

We've had such a great year up in Harris and as we approach 2025 I thought I'd write a little of what we've been up to and what our plans are for next year. 

We started 2024 in fine spirits with an established team of coworkers - Matt on gardening and e-commerce (strange but true), Caroline on making, Alexander on dispatch and invoicing, Stevie on coffee roasting and Connie running the Temple in Northton. We were joined by Eric who proved to be adept at all things coffee and Greg who has been fantastic front of house and then Sam also joined the team helping Caroline on making and stock control - she is fast becoming the queen of balm making.

Without these fantastic people, we couldn't have done a fraction of what we do. They breathe life into my ideas and find ways of making them work. I am so very lucky to have them all. They are all really special.

 We were delighted to be named by the Beauty Shortlist the Organic/Natural Beauty Brand of 2024 and the Sustainable Beauty Brand of 2024. Our Cleansing Mask was named product of the year and the Wild Beauty Balm won Best Face Balm of the year. We were thrilled. We still are. We work so hard to make our products really special, it was great to be acknowledged by some of the leading lights in the industry.

In 2024 we began to expand our therapeutic range realising that women would benefit from specific supportive Tinctures and Teas. So we created the Menopause Tincture, The Digestive Tincture and the Heartease Tincture, I really love these products they are so gentle but so effective. I have had lots of emails from women who have found them to be transformative and that really confirms that we're moving in the right direction.

 In October the BBC Designing the Hebrides programme finally aired, almost a year after the work was done. It was a huge relief to be able to openly talk about the project which has been so brilliant for our workshop. Banjo and his team were absolutely fantastic as were the crew and John the director was wonderful to work with. Really good design is utterly transformative and Banjo brought a reflection of our work and values right into the heart of our space. If you haven't seen the programme, it's still on BBC IPlayer  - season 2 episode 2.

We've collaborated with Immerse Hebrides/Salt Box Sauna on 3 products to use in their Sauna. It's a pleasure to work with other local companies that share our ethos. Norma, who runs it, is so full of life and plans that every discussion feels like a breath of fresh air.

We're also advising on a project on Ronay Island just off the coast of Uist so I'm busily thinking of interesting uses of Heather and Seaweed. I plan to visit when the sea is calm - I find the orange ribs terrifyingly bouncy so my visits will be well timed.

 The Summer was a wash out in terms of weather and we are profoundly glad that we have the greenhouse - 24m x 8m of protected growing space. We packed it full of Roses, Calendula, Chamomile and masses of other therapeutic plants including Ashwagandha and Lemon Verbena. Our harvests have been really good all year.

Outside the Mints grew like wildfire, our Nettles flourished and we wild harvested Wild roses, Yarrow, Plantain, Gorse, Bogbean, Bog Myrtle, Ladies Bedstraw, Red and White Clover, Meadowsweet, Dandelion, Honeysuckle and Mares Tail. 

The Seaweed was plentiful for the products and to mulch the beds. We picked Fucus, Kelp, Polysiphonia and Dulse. Some we dried, some was tinctured and the rest were distilled. All were great.

Working as we do is hard but so rewarding. The vitality we get in our products can only be found where the time from plant to pot is minimal. A plant that is grown organically, loved and appreciated and then made into a product as soon as it is ready has remarkable properties. I think it's why our products are so full of life and so beneficial, whether it be the skincare, the teas, the first aid balms or the tinctures. 

A.S Apothecary has really come into its own this year - we are the only Scottish brand in Claridge's Spa and indeed one of only a handful of brands selected to be used there. I love seeing the products leaving for London, Claridge's is such an iconic hotel.

Next year we'll be supplying the newly built Spa at Crossbasket Castle in High Blantyre - in fact our products will be the only ones used in the Spa and every product draws on Scottish botanicals. It's going to be really special.

The Coach House Spa at Beaverbrook House continues to be one of our favourite places, we regularly offer remote training to their new staff which is a treat. In 2025, we'll be doing even more there.

We continue to work with the Isle of Harris Distillery supplying them with the Sugar Kelp Aromatic Water for their gin and skincare to sell in the distillery shop. It's been such a longstanding and valuable relationship. We look forward to many more years of collaboration.

In the summer, we went down to North Uist Distillery to run a foraging and cocktail making day - the sun shone, the wind blew and it was a beautiful day. Jonny and Kate are absolutely brilliant and so committed to their local community. We wish them every success with their endeavours.

We have been so touched that both North Uist Distillery and Barra Distillery sell Wild Eve our non-alcoholic spirit in their shops. It's great that everyone is considered, even in a distillery and, given the sales, it's clear that it works well for all of us.

I recently phoned some of our customers and found that so informative - I value people's thoughts on what we do and what they need. It helps me to understand what I need to be working on. If you have any thoughts or ideas, do get in touch and arrange a call - I now have a dedicated email amanda@asapoth.com

From those calls, one issue that was raised was sleep. Especially during menopause and also beyond, sleep can become really problematic. So I've started to work on a sleep cream/balm, if you'd like to be a tester, do let me know and I'll add you to the list.

The other area was hair care - I've wrestled with all natural shampoo for years and then quite suddenly, in a moment of inspiration, cracked it. We're into the final tests for it but the signs are very good. It's an easy to use bar and it makes your hair super shiny and lustrous. I'm now working on the accompanying conditioning bar because I think both are needed. I chose a bar for each rather than a bottle to make  it totally waste free and easy to pack for travel. The conditioner is a little tricky to make, it has to have exactly the right melting point - nearly there...

We've also started sharing more of our plant work through our social media platforms, I've been lured into appearing in front of the camera more and am starting to enjoy it - I'd love to share the out-takes one day, they make me laugh so much, on one recent video we got the camera angle so wrong it looked as though I only had one leg. If you don't already follow us on Instagram, it is the place I post most often about what we're doing. Our page is @asapoth.

If you enjoy our coffee, we have a new Brazil and Peru that will be online in the next few days so look out for those - I've been thoroughly enjoying sampling them. We have exciting news about creating some functional mushroom blends in 2025 but more on that later. 

I had a meeting recently where I was asked what I do - I thought for what felt like a million years, with the tumbleweed blowing round my brain trying to summarise it all and finally realised that our only goal is to make mature women feel better, confident and valued. We do that by offering skincare to rejuvenate the skin and restore their glow, options to drink that are mood boosting and alcohol free, teas and tinctures to balance hormones and calm anxiety and therapeutic balms for health. We are fast becoming a one-stop shop for Menopause and all those glorious years beyond.

Every plant we grow and every product we make is intended to make women's lives better and so as we head into 2025, we're looking forward to doing more of exactly that from our little island home.