More Q&A from Donna and Lauren

Check out the “Mother & Daughter Beauty Experts” article from New Beauty Fall/Winter ’09.

Here are a few questions that didn’t make the cut for the New Beauty “Mother & Daughter Beauty Experts” article but we feel are just as interesting nonetheless.

• How do you define beauty?

Donna: I tend to downplay beauty that is thrown at us through the media.  In fact, it really turns me off.  To me, beauty is an attitude and an expression of how we see ourselves.  If we are content with what we’ve been given and can get over the superficial hurdle of beauty self-consciousness, we can move on to real beauty.  A sincere smile, playful eyes, and good grooming out of self-respect are a few characteristics of natural beauty.

Lauren: Beauty is when you feel like you’re glowing.  You feel it on the inside – you stand up straighter, you smile more proudly, and you have that energy of peace, confidence, and excitement all at the same time.  When you feel that on the inside, others see it on the outside.

• What’s your beauty routine?

Donna: Considering I own a skin care business, my beauty routine is quite basic.  I love baths, especially when I add Chivas goat milk bath salts, and typically take one bath a day where I wash my face and body with our goat milk soap.  I spray my face with rose water and then apply our goat milk crème.  Once a week, I exfoliate my face and body just to remove dead skin.  Until I started using Chivas products, my skin would feel dry after about just a few hours of applying facial moisturizer.  Now my skin feels great all day long.

Lauren: If you define beauty as that “glowing feeling”, your beauty routine is synonymous with your entire lifestyle.  It’s not only how you care for you skin, how much you sleep and how often you exercise, but it’s also whether or not you feel grounded in your life.

That being said, respecting yourself means caring for yourself.  So I don’t think one’s skin care routine should be devalued.  Just like I feel better about my day when I make my bed, I feel better about myself when I take the time to wash my face.  I’m very basic though:  every morning and evening I wash my face with Chivas “Clear Complexion” goat milk soap, and apply eye crème (I’ve been using Weleda Rose eye crème lately, but we are hoping to launch a new Chivas eye crème in Fall 2009) and Chivas “Sweet Nothings” goat milk facial crème.   I try to exfoliate every day but that’s hit or miss.  I try to use a masque once a week, but I can’t tell you the last time I actually did.  My mom and I are both very simplistic when it comes to our personal skin care, which I think translates over to the simplicity of our Chivas Skin Care line.

• What’s the one product every woman should have (can be from your own line or an outside company)?

Donna: Every woman should have a facial crème that they have confidence in.  I look forward to applying Chivas Sweet Nothings Facial Crème.  Our facial crème contains jojoba, avocado and neem oils among many other skin conditioning ingredients.  I also love the scent, which is made from 11 essential oils and developed by my daughter, Lauren.  My skin has never been happier.

Lauren: Soap is the foundation, so every woman should have a soap that she feels is both cleansing and moisturizing.  For me that soap is our Chivas Goat Milk Soap, which suits my hands, body & face all-in-one. Many women use a more harsh body wash or face cleanser (which are technically detergents) and then have to counteract that with an expensive and rich body lotion or face cream.   If you have a good soap, it should leave your skin so moisturized that you don’t really need a body lotion.  I have not used body lotion even once since I started using Chivas soap.  Facial crème is a different story; I use it to protect the more sensitive skin from wrinkles. But honestly, my skin never feels dry!

• What’s the one product you can’t live without?

Donna: I could not live without Chivas Goat Milk Soap because my skin stays supple even though I wash my hands so often.

Lauren: I used to carry 5 lip balms with me everywhere I went.  I struggled with dry, crackly lips and switched around from one medicated lip balm to another.  Now, I have one tube of Chivas “Original Vegan Lip Balm” and that’s all I need.  And rather than using it once an hour, I used it like once every other day.  I think I still have the same tube I started with when we launched the product in 2008.  While I have nothing but good things to say about our lip balm, I feel I must also attribute my happy lips to the lifestyle change of drinking lots of water and using flax seed oil and fish oil supplements.  At the end of the day, it’s more about what goes in your body than what goes on it.

• Why is creating an all-natural product important to you?

Donna: I have been interested in natural products long before they became popularized.  I have never liked using artificial ingredients when cooking.  It didn’t make sense to use artificial ingredients on my body either.  Many companies use fragrance oils to scent their skin care products, and others combine fragrance oils with natural essential oils.  I admit that fragrance oils can smell really good, are less expensive than essential oils, and are more concentrated because they are man-made.  Lauren and I made a commitment to go the extra mile and only use all natural ingredients in our soap, which means no fragrance oils.  In fact, we are not required to list the ingredients on our soap label, but we are proud to list ours.

• What’s the best advice your mother ever gave you?

Lauren: Growing up, my Mom was not one to tell me what to do or how to do it.  For example, I pushed myself to be a straight-A student and my Mom was the one telling me not to worry so much.  Now, as I mature, I come to her for advice on life decisions – “Should I break up with him?” “Which school should I go to?”  She is a good listener.  She rarely gives set-in-stone advice, but gives me the space to come to my own decisions.  And it’s a comforting feeling to know that if I take a wrong turn, she accepts my mistakes.  This commitment to unconditional love is my Mom’s best form of advice.   She leads by strong example, not by empty words.

• Do you have a business motto?

Donna: Simplicity with integrity.

Lauren: Good for your skin. Good for your environment.

Bash Eco Events calls Chivas the bee’s knees

Photo Credit:  Myra Vides.  Collage Compilation: Paige Appel

Paige Appel owns Bash Eco Events, writes a guest column for Design*Sponge, and plans beautiful, original, and environmentally conscious events in Southern California.  On her blog, she writes a weekly B.E.E.s KNEES post about what’s stung her of late.

She devoted a recent B.E.E.s KNEES post to Chivas, calling our goat milk soaps her “absolute favorite soaps on the planet.” Paige goes on to say that our our goat milk bath salts are “so soft and heavenly that I practically fall asleep in my tub.” And she drops our lip balms into her party favor bags.  You can check out her complete review here.  Thanks, Paige!

Pioneer Woman raves about Chivas

Photo credit: Ree Drummond

We were excited to see Ree Drummond, the blogger behind The Pioneer Woman, feature products from Chivas Skin Care.  She declared our product scents “divine,” saying, “When I picked up the box, I was immediately struck by the scent-ohhhhhh, the scent… I can’t even begin to tell you how good it smelled.”

We especially love the above photo which shows how she displayed our goat milk soaps, creme, bath salts and vegan lip balms for her guests.  What a great reuse of our crinkle packing paper too!

You can read full story and see more of Ree’s stunning photos here.

Simply Stated, Chivas is the Real Deal

As a beauty line that prides itself on simplicity, we definitely feel a bond with the mission of the Real Simple magazine.  We were happy to see our products featured in one of the Real Simple blogs, Simply Stated.

Real Simple staffer and one of the writers for Simply Stated, Julee Wilson, wrote that Chivas is “a simple line of natural, handmade skin care products focusing on the benefits of fresh goat milk and aromatherapy.” She continues to note that the line has expanded from goat milk soap to also include “facial cremes, lip balms and even bath salts!

Click here for the rest of her review.

Chivas for Conscious Living

Chivas co-founder Lauren Johanson also co-founded Your Daily Thread (aka ydt), known as LA’s neighborhood guide to conscious living.  Fellow ydt co-founder Tracy Hepler, recently published an article on the site entitled “The Wonderful World of Goat Milk.”

Hepler revealed, “I’ve benefited first hand from using Chivas products for over two years now. My skin is soft and doesn’t reek of artificial fragrances. ” She suggests interested readers try the Chivas Starter Pack, which includes our lip balm, goat milk soap, face creme, and bath salts.

For the complete story, click here.

« Previous Page