Whole Foods to sell local products

Among its offerings, the store will sell locally made aromatherapy products. Whole Foods plans to open its doors on Wednesday, May 23 at 3804 Oleander Drive.

Founder and owner of Sambuca Modern Apothecary, Kristen Myer, will sell some of her line of aromatherapy roll-ons to the national natural food store. Whole Foods will carry the top seven of 14 scents of Remedies to Roll, which retails at $13.95 per 10 milliliter bottle. She will continue to sell the product at Sambuca.

Wilmington graphic designer, Emily Peace, helped broker the deal. Peace designs product packaging for Sambuca and is co-founder of another local product Whole Foods will carry.

When Peace first found out that Whole Foods was opening in Wilmington, she contacted the company and got the phone number for the regional buyer for its Whole Body section. After several phone calls, she met the regional buyer outside the new store’s construction site and showed her the products. After submitting paperwork and follow-up emails, the products were approved.

“I just got my email today that they will pick me up,” Peace said. The store will sell meditation cards she designed and created with local yoga instructor Rose Tan. The Mindful Mantra Yantra Cards are a pack of 33 cards and a bottle of essential oils in an organza bag that retails for $24. Whole Foods will pay her the wholesale price and sell it for the same retail price it's sold at other local stores including Lovey’s, Sambuca and McKay Healing Arts, Peace said.

Both products will have specially designed displays in the store. An added plus: the products will now be in the Whole Foods system, which may open doors for distribution in other Whole Foods locations, she said.

“I will be in the North Carolina system and can approach other stores,” Peace said.

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