Growing Organic, a new business focusing on organic gardening and natural homeopathic products, recently opened its first retail location in Grand Junction, Colorado. This niche storefront is located at 383 Indian Rd, slightly northeast of Las Colonias Park.
After nearly five years of selling their goods online, Growing Organic now stands as the only business in Mesa County that caters to sustainable at-home gardening and mushroom cultivation products. The new store sells everything from handcrafted probiotic skincare to organic soil-building kits and numerous plant-based medicines.
In addition to serving the gardening community, Growing Organic strives to be planet-friendly, with almost all of its products being sold in either reusable or compostable packaging.
“Growing Organic isn’t just an organic retailer. We’ve tried to live the life we preach. Our overall goal is to spread information about organics and probiotics,” one of the company’s founders Andrew Flad said.
Andrew Flad and Rebecca Ryan had originally created Growing Organic in 2014 as a way to inform the community about organic farming, with no intention of selling anything. However, in 2017, they began selling their products to the local community.
Their first product was the Kashi Blend, which consists of fermented grain that can compost plant material and provides proper nutrients to the soil.
Gradually, the shop’s repertoire expanded to include wellness products such as probiotic soap bars, shampoos and facial scrubs. Flad credits their retail expansion to continuous growth in sales and demand.
In spite of the company’s success, Flad says Growing Organic is not just a place of commerce; the company thrives on helping people with their own at-home sustainability goals. Flad shares recipes online for some of his products, as well as educational videos on how to make things like soaps, salves and bokashi–composted ‘tea’ for your plants–at home.
“A lot of the garden products we make are based on old farming technology from Japan; we didn’t invent this. And, because [of this], we want others to succeed and be informed that Growing Organic is an open source,” Flad said.
Growing Organic prides itself on helping to educate the local gardening and natural wellness communities.
“Sometimes, we’ll get calls and emails from non-customers that have gardening questions, and we go above and beyond to help them as well,” Flad said. “We want people to be successful whether they purchase from us or not.”
Looking into the future, Flad is hopeful about this new expansion. This retail addition will help Flad and Ryan not only continue their online business, but to support the local “hobby gardener and organic lifestyle enthusiasts.”
As the business grows, Growing Organic continues to expand its catalog in order to meet increasing demand. Over the last 18 months, at-home mushroom-growing products have been particularly sought after. Andrew now sells kits to grow mushroom strains, including Oyster, Lion’s Mane and many other assortments.
All of these products, recipes, instructional videos and more can be found on their website growingorganic.com, or in their new store.
