When it comes to using her skills to help others, Hajni Kele has turned her passion for soap-making into a way of helping people with sensitive skin find relief. Based in Carrigaline, Hajni is a master formulator and product development expert for Codex Labs, which produces skincare products that have clinically proven, meaningful benefits.
While she moved here in 2005, Hajni is originally from Debrecen in Hungary. While she grew up there during a time of communist rule, she says she didn’t really experience any of the negative effects of this regime. “I went to primary school that was absolutely fantastic and offered a really versatile range of school activities like sport, dance and choir,” she says. “It also had its own swimming pool, library and cinema, so I had a great time and didn’t grow up feeling in any way inhibited.”
Hajni says that she grew up in a very safe and nurturing environment, and her biggest influence was her grandmother.
“She was amazing and totally my best friend, and my chief buddy for any craft adventures,” she says. “So if I came up with an idea, she would be totally on board to find a way of executing it somehow. And so the two of us were kind of dipping in from one project to another, and nothing was impossible for my grandmother. I think that’s a huge thing that I brought with me.”
Hajni moved to Budapest to attend the International Pető András Institute, which specialises in holistic approaches to children and adults with neurological disorders. It was a four-year conductive education course that trained students as primary school teachers, combined with skills in physiotherapy, occupational therapy and speech and language therapy.
“It’s a little bit like being the conductor in the orchestra, so as one person, you are equipped with the skills to tackle all areas of development” she says. “So, just say, in a child with cerebral palsy, you have to be able to teach them as a school teacher, but also pick up on opportunities to tackle gaps in their physical mobility or speech. When children are exposed to this sort of early intervention approach, eight hours a day, five days a week, you can make immense progress.”
While Hajni was at college, she became a big fan of a band that was playing Irish music, and went to their weekly sessions. She also spent a summer in Dingle. Just after she graduated, a contact who knew she was obsessed with Irish music told her about an opportunity in Donegal to work on a summer camp for children with cerebral palsy.
“They were like, ‘Are you able to come and help,’ and of course, I was on the next flight,” she laughs.
Hajni says she fell in love with Ireland, but couldn’t find a permanent position here, so she spent the next few years working in Sweden, England and the Netherlands. She had by then met her partner Mike, who is from Enniscrone in Sligo, and after five years of living in the Netherlands, they decided to move to Ireland.
Hajni found work with a non-profit group in Bandon, with families who used to go to Hungary with their children to avail of this early intervention service. “They would leave everything behind and travel to Hungary for a few months, and that was too much strain for the families,” she says. “They wanted to recruit somebody who was trained at the Pető Institute to come and provide the services here, so there was a job opening and the timing was right.”
Hajni moved to Cork in 2006 and her son, Hugo, was born in 2008. The position she had ended as she was coming back from maternity leave and she couldn’t find another position in early intervention, so she moved into soap-making.
Her interest in soap-making began when she was living in the Netherlands and decided to take it up as a hobby as her day job was pretty intense, mentally, physically and emotionally. She became fascinated by it and learned everything from researching the Internet and experimenting at home.
”There was no YouTube back and only a limited amount of information,” she recalls. “At the time, there was only a small forum of American soapmakers, a couple of German ones and some random people, but we were learning from each other and organising swaps. It was peer learning and very different to how it is now.
“There were at least 200 staff at the school I was working in, and I decided that every Monday, I would bring in these tiny samples with me and let them try it and give feedback. It sounds ridiculous, but it was a genius idea, because women will always be brutally honest, so they were my best focus group and the feedback I got was amazing.”
When she was unable to get another job in early intervention education, Hajni decided to try soap-making as a career as by then, she had developed what she felt was a pretty good product. She called her business Mianra Artisan Soaps (mianra is the Irish word for mineral), and used ingredients like seaweed, goat’s milk, buttermilk and carrot in her artisan bars of soap. She initially worked from home when toddler Hugo was in bed, but after her first time exhibiting at the trade show, Showcase, in the RDS, she came home with 35 orders.
Hajni decided to rent a small premises in Douglas and ran the business for seven years, but while it was very enjoyable, she was a one-woman show and the demands were immense. “I didn’t have a sales team and just couldn’t see a way of growing the business,” she says, adding that in that kind of business, you really need to sell volumes of product to make a decent living.
Hajni eventually closed the business to work with Codex Labs, the Silicon Valley-based skin-tech pioneer founded by Dr. Barbara Paldus. It stands at the intersection of science and beauty, and its plant-powered biotech is dedicated to supporting the microbiome and pioneering products having clinically proven, meaningful skincare benefits.
There is a strong Irish connection as when Barbara was examining natural skincare brands around the world for products suitable for her baby son, Joseph, she came across Bia Beauty, a Cork-based company. It became the first company she acquired when she set up her skincare collective that is based on traditional herbal knowledge, native plants and modern science.
“I heard about Codex pretty much when it was in the process of taking over from Bia Beauty,” says Hajni. “I had an interview with Barbara and she explained what she was trying to achieve, and she offered me a position in product development.
“The switch to Codex was very appealing, because as much as I was very proud of what I achieved in my own business and was a bit disheartened to let it go, at that point in life, we needed security. To have the security of the job and a wider team and much bigger venture was very much appealing to me.”
Seven years later, Hajni is a master formulator and product development expert for Codex Labs, which has subsidiaries in the Czech Republic, the UK, the US and Ireland
“I basically run the Irish subsidiary and am part of the product development team, but my main role is looking after the soap manufacturing, globally,” she says. “What Barbara has very much prioritised in the business from the start is evidence, so everything is backed up by clinical trials.”
While Hajni knew she made “bloody good soap,” the clinical reports that showed how well the products performed was very reassuring. One of Codex Labs’ top products is its Bia Unscented Soap, which has been approved by the Eczema Association in the US, and is recommended by dermatologists.
“There’s no scent, no colours, no swirls, no visual appeal as such – there’s nothing to distract the user from the actual quality of the soap,” she says. “People with sensitive skin and eczema absolutely love using it.”
While Hajni loves her job and gets a lot of satisfaction from it, she also loves living in Cork. “My favourite thing is the people,” she says. “We have made great friends and neighbours.”
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