Packing my Cold Process Soaps

[AliBx]

I use the cold process technique to make soaps. I've been doing this for over a year now.

I'm actually in the process of packing 300 bar soaps. However, I have a question. I have about a week and a half left for my soaps to be completely cured (well the recommended 4-6 weeks). It will be 4 weeks later when the wedding starts. However, since I have so many of them to pack, I need to start the process of packing these soaps early. With that said, how should I go about doing this. I don't want to get the crazy bug of the DOS (dreaded orange spots).

I live in MI and have a dehumidifier in the basement (where to soaps are curing).

I'm thinking of moving all of these bar soaps to the upstairs guestroom, where it would be less humid? And maybe leave the boxes opened as seen in the image attached? With a dehumidifier and a fan? Or is that a stretch. Any advise would help.

 

[Catscankim]

I don't think I have a real answer to your questions, but in experience, I had my soaps curing just fine in a closet in a relatively non humid closet. I went on a weird binge of putting damp-rid everywhere in my house (I'm in Florida). The soaps that were directly above the damp rid bucket got dried out to the point of being non usable. Wish I had a picture, but I was in a hurry to move stuff because I had a house guest coming. But the soaps had been curing there for a while, and I was literally selling off the shelf from there..were all hard and crumbly on the side that was directly above the damp rid.

The soaps that I had stored in my fairly humid garage all got dos, but they were also my pre-citric acid soaps.

So I think with storing soaps in both extremes...the best thing is just really good air-flow. Just my opinion.

 

[AliBx]

I don't think I have a real answer to your questions, but in experience, I had my soaps curing just fine in a closet in a relatively non humid closet. I went on a weird binge of putting damp-rid everywhere in my house (I'm in Florida). The soaps that were directly above the damp rid bucket got dried out to the point of being non usable. Wish I had a picture, but I was in a hurry to move stuff because I had a house guest coming. But the soaps had been curing there for a while, and I was literally selling off the shelf from there..were all hard and crumbly on the side that was directly above the damp rid.

The soaps that I had stored in my fairly humid garage all got dos, but they were also my pre-citric acid soaps.

So I think with storing soaps in both extremes...the best thing is just really good air-flow. Just my opinion.

Thanks. Yeah! I think I need to figure out my air circulation. I have the humidifier on right now, but at 50% in the basement. The fan is on too. I don't really leave the fan on all day, but from time to time, I do put on the fan. I guess I have to keep checking the soaps to figure this out cause I'm not sure what to do.

I may just have to pull an all-nighter and let the soap cure on their on for the remaining 1.5 weeks without packing them. So far, I've packed 67 of them. Of that 67, about 50 of them have reached 10 weeks of curing. So I'm good there. The others need about 1.5 weeks to go. I may just NOT pack any of the newer ones until the very very last minute before the wedding. Not sure yet though.