By Jennifer Christman
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

That the brochure for Bath Junkie, downtown Little Rock's quirky new soap and shower gel shop, says the store is located at the River Market when it's actually several streets away is not a misprint.

It’s optimism.

Judy Zimmer and daughter Jocelyn Morelli ("We're the Suds, you know, like the Judds?")—owners of the franchise that has locations in Fayetteville, Eureka Springs, Branson and Tulsa — have high hopes that their business and future ones will work up a commercial lather in a cut of downtown that could use some scrubbing.

"We feel that this part of the city, right here, is going to be part of the River Market," Zimmer says, fingers working drops of scented oil into a batch of bath salts in a big metal basin on the counter. "Eventually when we’ve got the trolley line and more businesses move in here, we really think that will happen."

Maybe it will. And maybe it’s Bath Junkie's specialty—custom blended bath and body products—that will make it so.

For right now, however, the store is the lone business sitting on the first floor of the former Arkansas Gazette building. It's the glassy shop in the corner you've noticed when stalled at the light at Third and Louisiana streets. — the one that has you wondering what is in it and how exactly it stays in business.

What's in it a New York loftlike decor that is minimalist and colorful at the same time. Simple metal shelves that hold gel-filled martini glass candles, funky glycerin soaps and giant plain jugs of oil and moisturizer. Bottles and bottles of fragrance oils that can make bath products smell like anything imaginable (raspberry, cinnamon, Polo Sport) or unimaginable (caramel? Woodstock?). A party table where kids can celebrate a birthday or gals can have a girls' night out and take home custom-made mini-size products as favors for $15 per person.

How it stays in business: word of mouth. The women—and, yes, men — who work downtown and use their lunch hour and come back on weekends ("Saturday, believe it or not, is our busiest day," Morelli says) to satisfy their addiction.

The store's name says it all.

"I don’t know why people are so addicted to bath stuff," Zimmer says. "I think it's something that gives people a mini-vacation if they use it properly.

I think a lot of people work just to have a vacation every year, and this stuff gives you a vacation every week or every day."

Zimmer knows about vacations. Before becoming a baroness of the bath, she worked in the travel industry and the mortgage business out in California. Before the bubble biz, Morelli was working in showbiz.

How did the mother-daughter team end up in these parts selling calendula-comfrey lotion?

Long story, short: A China lily-scented gal in a bagel shop prompts Morelli to ask where she got her fragrance — a bath store. Morelli frequents and then starts working in the bath shop. Mom gets the idea to open a shop in a mall in California. Mall and shop go belly-up. Mom and husband retire to Fayetteville. Morelli eventually joins them and talks Mom into opening a bath store. They open a small bath counter in a friend's dress shop and outgrow it. They open their first store in Fayetteville in 1995. There's so much interest, they open a Eureka Springs location in 1998, a Tulsa location in 1999 and another Tulsa location, a Branson location and the Little Rock store (December) in 2000.

The two rotate their schedules so they can travel to each store every few weeks, Zimmer says, adding, "If we own it, we like to be very hands-on."

That, and they like playing with the stuff, er, working with customers to craft just the right product.

"Here, smell," Zimmer says, holding out the peach fragrance oil to the reporter.

Isn't that good?" Morelli asks. "We put a lot of effort into the oil selection. With peach, we really wanted something that smells like a peach, not chemicals."

The peach — or fig or gardenia or Calyx perfume or red apple or a combination of all of them or the other 100-some scents — can be added to anything, from shimmering lotion to body mist to bubble bath (price is $8.75 for 4 ounces, $17 for 8 ounces) to salt scrub ($20) to bath salts ($15).

The customizing doesn't stop there. Customers can also pick the color of their creations.

"I'm a real compulsive," Zimmer says. "I love having all my bath stuff match my towels and my wallpaper. But if I wanted something purple, I was always going to have to buy something plumeria or another fragrance I didn't like. I had to end up getting stuff I didn't like for the color. So this way, if you like the fragrance of pear and your bathroom is purple, you can do it.

"Mango doesn't have to be peach, it can be green."

That might be a shock for folks who have spent years shopping in stores where the only choices are an amber-colored vanilla, a green-colored juniper and a pink-colored raspberry.

"People come in and get completely overwhelmed," Morelli says. "They've never been anywhere where they can get exactly what they want"

Zimmer seconds: "We're challenging them to be creative."

When customers are finished creating, their favorite scents will be logged in Bath Junkie's "registry" — or card file — for easy gift-giving.

Splish Splash

Chris Moses says he already discovered the gift-giving potential of Bath Junkie at Christmas.

"I got body scrub exfoliating stuff, something like that, for my girlfriend," he says.

Moses isn't the average customer, however. He's with Moses Nosari Tucker Real Estate Inc., the leasing agents who are working to get more businesses in the former Gazette building, as well as the nearby Federal Reserve building.

"They do look a little lonely out there, don't they?" Moses says about Bath Junkie. "We're trying to get them some neighbors."

While Moses says he can't name the businesses his firm has been talking to, he can talk concept

"We're working with a hair salon," he says. "We're working with a financial consulting firm. We've just signed a lease with an architecture firm. We're also working with a larger multi-concept restaurant. We're going to have a barbecue eatery taking up 3,500 to 4,500 square feet."

And that's probably good.