Soap-selling sisters making a difference at Pink Ribbon Girls
Not many kids can say they’ve started their own business. Gia and Alana Maroevich are not like most kids.
Ages 12 and 13, the sister duo began making their own soaps in 2020, mixing oils, blending colors and molding bars into fragrant works of art they sell at Dolores Park in San Francisco.
“It’s so much fun and so creative,” says Alana, age 13. “We started selling them at the park and we were like, ‘Wow, this could actually make some money.’”
Alana and Gia Maroevich pose with a basket of their hand-made soaps.
What makes their craft even more rewarding, Alana says, is using it to help make the world a better place. When Russia invaded Ukraine earlier this year, Gia and Alana began selling their soaps to raise funds for the Ukrainian Red Cross.
This summer, they found a cause to support that hit closer to home when their mom, Tracey Murnaghan Maroevich, was diagnosed with breast cancer in August. Tracey began utilizing Pink Ribbon Girls’ free services, and Gia and Alana started planning their next big fundraiser – this time for PRG.
The Maroevich sisters sold 375 bars of their soap to raise more than $500 to help support other families battling breast and gynecological cancers in the Bay Area.
“Pink Ribbon Girls was so supportive when I got diagnosed – the girls said that they wanted to help PRG because they had really helped us,” Tracey says. “With Pink Ribbon Girls, it felt like someone really cared.”
Tracey moved to the United States from Ireland some two decades ago for a marketing job. She fell in love with an American and wound up staying here, putting an Atlantic Ocean’s worth of distance between her and her family. That made receiving a cancer diagnosis this summer all the more devastating.
“Being from Ireland with no family in America, I felt very alone,” Tracey says. “Suddenly, I felt so far away from home. It was overwhelming.”
Fortunately for Tracey, PRG was there to provide meals for her entire household, rides to treatment, a housecleaning kit and peer support. Those services were critical to Tracey, who relied on the rides to get to appointments when she was unable to drive for a month after her lumpectomy and surgery to have her lymph nodes removed.
“The idea of not being able to drive or feed my family was terrifying,” Tracey says. “Pink Ribbon Girls coming in and helping with that was such a huge relief. It meant so much to my family.”
Gia and Alana Maroevich made Ukraine-themed soaps to sell to benefit the Ukrainian Red Cross.
That’s how Gia and Alana decided to devote their ambition, creativity and business acumen to supporting PRG. Fundraising and thinking big come naturally to the pair. In grade school, Alana founded an overnight outdoor education program so the kids in her grade could discover the joy of nature, and Gia started a Leadership & Affinity program called GALS to help underserved girls use their voices to advocate for themselves and build connections during COVID.
With that kind of resume, it’s no surprise Gia and Alana quickly figured out how to navigate the soap-selling scene. Their business – named “Foam N Fizz SF” to accommodate their ambitions of eventually branching out into bath bombs – has its own website as well as a cohort of their friends they hired to help sell their products. Every bar of soap is unique – Gia’s favorite part is adding and blending the colors into fantastic designs while Alana loves the scent creation.
“Teamwork allows us to see things in a different and unique light,” Gia says. “That's why we work together and collaborate on all of the soap batch designs. Our teamwork gives us fantastic results and every bar of soap is unique, just like us.”
Alana and Gia Maroevich present a $500 check to PRG Community Engagement Coordinator Laurie Gillespie (center).
Gia and Alana spent many weekends in the park approaching bypassers and asking if they would like to support their small business. Alana says that part of the job was initially nerve-racking, but chatting with strangers about soaps has gotten much easier over time. The sisters’ dedication paid off, as the $500 they raised will provide 50 meals to PRG families.
“They were really, really proud to be able to help other families going through what we are going through,” Tracey says. “It meant so much to them to support not just their mom, but other people as well.”
Gia and Alana presented the proceeds to PRG in October – Breast Cancer Awareness Month – at Santa Clara University’s “Pink Out” soccer game. It was a proud moment for Tracey, who will undergo several months of chemotherapy beginning in late November followed by radiation.
As for Gia and Alana, they will continue to focus on growing their business, with a portion of sales continuing to go towards supporting philanthropic causes.
“Pink Ribbon Girls supported us so much, and we wanted to give back,” Alana says. “We want to use our gifts and talents to make the world a better place.”