After spending her younger years locally, graduating from Newtown High School and returning home through college, Beth Bogdan moved on and out to work in the music industry.

Readers may recall she created a philanthropic project following the 12/14 tragedy called “Music for Newtown” that raised more than $40,000 for support and relief efforts during two online auctions of musical memorabilia and collectibles.

During the time she was working in Los Angeles, Nashville, and then New York, she developed a talent for mixing all-natural substances and essential oils to create soothing balms and fast-absorbing hand cream for herself — and as special gifts for friends and family members.

“After years of mindfulness on what I put in and on my body, I researched natural remedies to minimize the use of medicines and chemicals, and I found a passion for essential oils,” she relates on her website, soundnaturals-usa.com.

One day, she came up with a face cream to help diminish a large, dark sunspot on her cheek.

“The cream was more like a butter or a balm, and after a few months of using it, I noticed a remarkable decrease in the size and color of the spot,” she wrote. “Others noticed it too and started asking to try the cream. And so began my mission to make it even better and to discover natural remedies for other issues, like warts, cysts, earaches, and dry skin.”

Bogdan said after launching the first tentative step in morphing a hobby into a home-based craft cosmetic business, COVID-19 decimated the entertainment industry and music business. Left without work in her field, Bogdan decided it was time to escalate her venture into a full-time enterprise, and Sound Naturals emerged.

The cottage cosmetic company was aptly named, as the former music business professional now resides beside the Long Island Sound in Mystic, and she remains committed to ensuring every product in her skin care line contains only natural ingredients like shea butter, coconut oil, apple cider vinegar, arrowroot powder, rose hips, and colloidal oatmeal.

Bogdan recently told The Newtown Bee that as she met folks around the country, she shared her homemade creams and “people started asking for it.”

After creating a website in early 2020 so customers across the globe could order one or more of the four products she still hand mixes and personally bottles and ships, COVID hit. And along with it came legions of new potential clients whose hands were drying out from washing and disinfecting multiple times a day.

“I know, because my own hands get dry in the winter, that the worst thing about hand creams is the oily residue that keeps you from being able to hold onto anything, and washes right off,” Bogdan said. “So I came up with a cream with a choice of two scents that has antibacterial properties and keeps softening your hands even after you wash them.”

Besides those hand creams — named Sunny Day and Summer Breeze, and offered in various sizes — Bogdan developed Sea Glass foot cream, Sunny Day and Summer Breeze body lotions, and her newest item, Shooting Star night balm.

“I made the foot cream for my own cracked heels, and people heard about it and wanted to try it themselves,” she said. “After making it for about five friends, I thought, hey, I should make this myself.”

All of the product recipes, ingredients, suppliers, packaging, and labels have been researched or created by Bogdan.

She is currently offering Newtown Bee and newtownbee.com readers a 20% discount via Local Steals and Deals (visit localstealsanddeals.com/pages/local-brands) on two gift sets: a Sunny Day Gold Gift Set, which includes an 8-ounce Sunny Day body lotion and a 4-ounce Sunny Day hand cream; and a Sun and Sea Gift Set, which includes a 4-ounce Sunny Day hand cream and a 3.8-ounce Sea Glass Foot Cream.

Readers can also get 20% off all products on Bogdan’s Etsy site (etsy.com/shop/soundnaturals) and website (soundnaturals-usa.com) through April 30 using the promo code NEWTOWN. Both sites have free shipping right now.

And while she is all-in with Sound Naturals, Bogdan is not ready to close the book on a music career. She said she is writing songs that she would like to pitch to recording artists, and has designs on starting a small company to help promote and develop local musical artists.

Learn more about Bogdan’s product line, promotions, and items to order by visiting soundnaturals-usa.com.