Interview With James From Terressentials

As I mentioned the other day, I had the pleasure of speaking with James Hahn, Co- Founder of Terressentials Organic & 100% Natural Body Care. This is quite an interesting story as James started the company with his life partner, Diana Kaye after Diana was diagnosed with "an unusually aggressive non-Hodgkin´s lymphoma" in the early 1990's. After completing chemotherapy, Diana became "highly sensitive to ordinary chemicals found in homes—detergents, cosmetics, weed killers" and thus Terressentials was born.

Q- I asked James if he and Diana were concerned about being "organic" or "green" prior to Diana's illness.

A- “I've personally been very into things like solar architecture and efficient vehicles for a very long time.” “I think the Post article (on the Terressentials website) puts it well:” "They bicycled to work, exercised at a health spa and washed down One-a-Days with bottled water. Breakfast was granola; dinner chicken and broccoli, food that´s good for you.”

Q- I asked him if he and Diana made their own formulations for their products.

A- “Yes, it’s just the two us. The company is comprised of just five full time people who do everything from producing the products, to the website, to the marketing etc.” “The process of formulating products is a slow one...an example being, it took 7 long years to come up with our Silken Velvet Body Lotion.”

Q- Not that I think Terressentials products are outrageously priced, but they are more expensive than the conventional brands, so I asked James about their pricing.

A- Per James, “We can´t buy our raw materials in bulk and we miss out on the truckload discounts big companies get, and using only certified-organic ingredients is pricey. We source our products from all over, as many products such as coconuts,
oranges, shea butter and many other ingredients we use don't grow in Maryland” where Terressentials is located. “Much of what you see on a conventional, "health-food" or boutique ingredient label is actually there in very small quantities -- in the biz, it's called "window dressing." The core ingredients of these products -- the detergents, emollients, solvents and such -- are cheap commodity chemicals. Compare that to products made only from ingredients like organic cocoa butter and shea butter or organic hibiscus flowers, with none of the common formulating oleochemicals or petrochemicals in there at all. It's not comparing apples to oranges...it's more like comparing a beaker filled with something you can't pronounce to an orange.” “On top of that, we really do hand-craft everything, including our herbal extracts.”
“100% of the products we craft are certified to the organic standard and we don't know of another company with a wide range of products anywhere that can make that claim. All of our products have a USDA or Maryland Dept. of Agriculture "Certified organic" seal on them”.

Q- Lastly, I asked James what his favorite product was and he had to think about it, as he obviously loves all of their products, but he finally came up with his answer:
A- The Hair Wash, although he stated it probably wouldn't be right for my overprocessed hair.


I also want to point out that, although he never met me, James was concerned about the fact that I color my hair, even suggesting I switch to Henna because it's not chemical based, nor is it harmful like conventional hair color. Now that, my friends, is a caring guy, which in my opinion, is the premise this company was built on.

**Everything Terressentials crafts scores between a 0 and a 3 on the EWG scale. Terressentials only uses ingredients that the USDA permits in certified organic food. If you don't see the USDA Certified Organic seal, the word "organic" doesn't mean anything, it's just a marketing ploy to get you to think the product is good for you when in reality that may not be the case.

Please follow this link for more information on what organic really means: http://www.terressentials.com/organicfaq.html

Terressentials website is: http://www.terressentials.com/