Banking exec swaps Middle East career to start family firm making pure soap after cancer diagnosis piques interest in chemical free cosmetics

A multinational banking executive has ditched her high-flying career in the Middle East and started a family business selling natural and sustainable soap after a shock cancer diagnosis piqued her interest in chemical-free cosmetics.

Clara Challoner Walker, 57,  discovered she had an oestrogen receptor positive form of breast cancer after returning to the UK in 2015 from her job in Saudi Arabia for an annual health check-up provided by her company.

Her diagnosis signalled the start of a complete life change for mum-of-two Clara, who now lives in Malton, North Yorkshire, with her husband, Philip, 61, who works with her at Cosy Cottage Soap.

She said: “I had been working in financial projects in the Middle East and Africa. I was usually based in Abu Dhabi while I was out there but I also spent two years in Saudi Arabia.

“It was absolutely fascinating, as it’s not a place you can really go as a tourist.

“All women, including me, had to wear an outfit that covered you from your feet right down to your hands. I had a special dispensation to not have to cover my hair, but I often did because it was easier and I didn’t stick out as much.”

She added: “It can be quite intimidating to enter an environment like that, but with the opportunity to be one of the few women to have held a senior position in Saudi Arabia, it felt important to break those barriers.

“The women in that country are amazingly talented and I can see progress on the horizon.”

Clara –  whose son Edward, 32, is a graphic designer for the soap business, while her daughter Emily, 29, runs its HR system, as well as being a midwife – had no idea anything was wrong when she received her diagnosis.

She said: “I had no symptoms or signs of anything, so I assumed the executive health check, which we had every year, would be routine.

“But when the results came back, the doctor revealed that I had breast cancer.

“I just stared at her in complete shock when she told me, I hadn’t seen it coming.”

When Clara was diagnosed, she was warned the cancer was fast spreading. She said: “The first step was for me to have an operation to have lymph nodes removed from under my left arm.

“Then they assessed me and found more cancer cells in my left breast, so I had a second operation to have breast tissue removed.”

She added: “After that, I started radiotherapy.”

After several rounds of radiotherapy, which finished in March 2016, she said her outlook on life really changed.

“After my diagnosis, my priorities changed,” she said.

She added: “I wanted to spend more time with my family, so I went part time at work while I had the cancer treatment.“I did a chemistry degree back in the 1980s,  so while I was going through treatment, I would go into shops and look at the labels on skincare products.

“Because of my chemistry training, I could recognise the ingredients and knew that a lot of them were carcinogens.”

She added: “I began to wonder if it was a good idea to put these things in and on to our bodies and I knew that it was actually possible to make products without all of these chemicals in them.”

As a result, Clara began making batches of soap at home, trialling different, natural ingredients.

She said: “It had to be natural and healthy, but also needed to smell amazing. Finding the right balance was a matter of trial and error.”

She added: “Throughout the year that I was working part time, I used my free hours to experiment with making different products and, by the time I left my job in December 2016, I already had batches of soap that I was starting to sell.”

Since leaving the world of high finance behind her, Clara has opened Cosy Cottage Soap, of which she is  CEO.

It operates online and in November 2020 also opened as a physical shop in Malton.

Clara said: “I first started from the perspective of looking at what is good for our bodies.

“I examined ways to develop products that work with our bodies, rather than fighting  against them.

“But then I started becoming concerned about the use of palm oil and the destruction of the rainforest, because of its presence in toiletries and cosmetics, as it’s cheap and readily available. So, I’ve actively sought to make products without palm oil from the start.”

She added: “Single use plastic is another thing I avoid. I became interested in thinking about the detrimental effect that it has on sea life and the environment, so I looked to eradicate all of that in our company.

“We don’t test anything on animals and we don’t ask anybody else to test things on animals on our behalf, because that’s apparently quite common in the cosmetics industry – to get someone else to do it for you.”

Clara is also keen to be as inclusive as possible when it comes to choosing her workforce.

She said: “We employ 19 people now and I try really hard to give opportunities to those who might find it difficult to otherwise get a job.

“That might be people in the older age bracket, or maybe women who need flexible working hours because of family commitments.

“We also do some work with a Down’s syndrome community of adults who have made products for us and I have done some work with a local prison.”

She added: “My mission is to give back to my local community as much as I can through the business.

“It’s a world away from my old life as a banking executive in Saudi Arabia but I will always follow my heart and work on what I’m passionate about.”

For more information, visit: cosycottagesoap.co.uk