A Vision for a New Economy

Walk into RM Soap Market on Tejon Street in downtown Colorado Springs and you might not immediately think "social enterprise." Your eyes take in the sweeping selection of luxury soaps and lotions, the spa-like home treatments and the beautifully curated gifts. It's the kind of sensory abundance that feels less like shopping and more like joy. That is entirely intentional.

RM Soap Market is not just a store; it is an engine. Every purchase of a hand-poured soap, every indulgent lotion, every beautiful gift is designed to flow back into the Story Impact Project and the community it serves.

Tony and Beth Feltman own the artisan skincare company, but their dreams are so much bigger. This Colorado Springs enterprise is a vision the Feltmans have spent years building into something the disability community rarely sees: a self-sustaining economy run largely by the people it ultimately serves.

"We actually bought RM Soap from friends we knew who were getting ready to retire," Tony says, laughing. "We started there in 2022 and our vision has just continued to grow."

The pivot point for this company and its owners was personal. When the Feltmans moved Beth's younger sister, Kari, from North Dakota to Colorado Springs, they ran into a fragmented system that struggled to balance support with independence for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (I/DD).

"We weren't looking for more services," Beth explains. "We were looking for ways for people like Kari to live full, engaged lives. Everyone needs to contribute to their community and to have purpose."

For years, like so many in the special needs community, Kari spent her days on the sidelines with limited engagement, hours of television and little connection to the larger community.

Tony and Beth wondered, what if everyone had a way to participate? That question drives the couple's effort to redefine what a local economy can look like for people like Kari, through pathways to purpose and paid work.

"Disability is not the problem when it comes to employing the I/DD community," says Tony. "It's opportunity. We've seen firsthand what happens when systems limit people instead of creating ways for them to contribute."

Kari was introduced into the RM Soap Market operation, not as a charity case, but as an employee. She received training, responsibilities and job expectations. Today, she is a productive member of the sales team. The transformation was not magic. It was what happens when someone is given a genuine chance to contribute.

Blueprint Behind the Business

The challenge the Feltmans recognized early was systemic. Social Security disability recipients face a punishing paradox, losing a dollar of benefits for every two dollars they earn. With the maximum SSI benefit hovering near $967 a month, the system discourages exactly the kind of participation it should reward, notes Tony.

Rather than work around that system, the Feltmans found a way to work within it. Through the Story Impact Project, employees and affiliates with disabilities get their own personal websites and storefronts. Customers who purchase through those pages get a 10% discount, and the affiliate earns a 20% commission. That 1099 income flows to parents or guardians, who can transfer up to $20,000 annually into ABLE accounts, tax-advantaged savings protected from SSI calculations. It is a legal, elegant route around a compromised structure.

Colorado has an estimated 50,000 people with special needs who receive services, and if only a fraction become affiliates earning $100 a month each, the math becomes significant.

Tony describes himself as a disruptor by nature, someone who looks at a broken model and sees a blueprint for reinvention rather than a problem.

"It's all going back to them," Tony says. "But it's more than money. It's dignity. It's a micro-business that's theirs."

It's a small moment, but it's everything. It's a moment measured in confidence and dignity rather than dependency, which is the heart of this brand and business.

"Many communities focus on giving people a second chance, which we fully support," Beth notes. "However, we feel individuals with special needs are still waiting for that first chance."

Small Beginnings

This Feltmans grew up as small-town kids in Grafton, North Dakota, a farm community of roughly 3,000 people. Beth arrived in Denver in 1998; Tony followed in 2001, settling in Colorado Springs. By 2003 they were married. Tony has an engineering degree from the University of North Dakota, worked in water purification, then moved into defense manufacturing. He founded a company in 2012 that would go on to produce the first hypersonic weapon in U.S. history.

Beth completed nursing school while raising their four sons and working nights at Penrose-St. Francis Health Services for 17 years, in mother-baby and nursery care. Together, they make an unlikely but irresistible team, the engineer who can't sleep past 3:30 a.m. and the nurse who approaches every problem with calm composure.

The Future

As program funding for ID/D services from the state and federal governments shifts and tightens, the Feltmans believe Colorado Springs has a unique opportunity to lead in this area.

A second phase of the RM project introduces a cooperative structure through the Story Impact Project's Foundation, with local business sponsorships layered on top. Rather than wages, businesses can sponsor "participation points" for community activities, like greeting customers or filling soap dispensers, which flow directly into the ABLE accounts. RM Soap Market handles fulfillment and logistics so participants can focus on engagement rather than operations.

"It's not a job. It's participation in our community," Tony explains. "I told one bank president I don't care if they just come in and high-five your employees. That small step builds culture."

"We believe every person's story matters," emphasizes Beth. "And when people are given the chance to show up and contribute, it changes how they see themselves, and how the world sees them."

Story Ranch is the current labor of love they're developing. The nonprofit arm of the Feltmans' enterprise is preparing to open a working therapeutic ranch in the Colorado Springs area serving employees, community members with disabilities and, very importantly, the families who love and care for them.

Beth, who will serve as owner and operator, describes the property as a live-work-play environment built around the animals she's been quietly accumulating for years. To date, she has two quarter horses, a pony, donkeys and chickens.

"Every time Tony went out of town," she admits, "I'd get another animal."

The ranch fills a gap the Feltmans see as both urgent and underserved. Roughly 80% of marriages involving a family member with a disability end in divorce, driven largely by caregiver burn-out and the lack of respite. Story Ranch is designed to be a place where families can decompress and reenergize, and individuals with disabilities can engage in meaningful activities: glamping, therapeutic horsemanship, community programming and a day program.

Ultimate Goals

"This isn't about creating another program," Tony says. "We're building an economy where people can contribute in ways that are meaningful and sustainable. The more soap we sell, the more this community is truly impacted. Our factory is equipped and prepared to triple its operations."

The affiliate program is live and growing, the cooperative structure is launching and the ranch is in development. Besides its Colorado Springs location, STORY by RM operates stores in Park Meadows in Lone Tree, and in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Boise, Idaho, with more on the way.

The Feltmans, who still make time for weekly date nights, who still go back to North Dakota to haul sugar beets, appreciate where they come from, and they look forward as they invest in our community.