Transcription of Tina Wilcoxson for the show Natural Foods from Local Farms #277
Lisa Belisle: My next guest is Tina Wilcoxson, who grew up on a farm in northern Maine, began working at Royal River Natural Foods 20 years ago, and worked her way up to general manager, and became the owner of the natural food store in Freeport three years ago. Thanks so much for coming in.
Tina Wilcoxson: Thank you for having me.
Lisa Belisle: It is one of my favorite stores, so obviously….
Tina Wilcoxson: Mine, too.
Lisa Belisle: Well, that’s really good to hear. Living in Yarmouth, I feel like we are so lucky to have that access right in Freeport. Why did you start working there? What was your initial connection 20 years ago?
Tina Wilcoxson: Well, I forget exactly how many years ago, but I went to massage therapy school in New Mexico. When I came back to Maine, I started working at a little health food store in Cape Elizabeth for a little while and really got to put into practice what I had learned about nutrition and herbal supplements and just overall healthy eating. That store burned down, so I waitressed for about a year. A friend of mine told me there was an opening at Royal River, and that’s where it started. I’ve worked in every department through the 20 years, and there was always something new to learn, and I just loved it. I never found a reason to leave.
Lisa Belisle: You actually grew up in northern Maine.
Tina Wilcoxson: Yes.
Lisa Belisle: Well, first of all where in northern Maine? It’s quite a vast area.
Tina Wilcoxson: Yeah. I grew up in Limestone in Aroostook County, and my father was a potato farmer. I grew up on a potato farm, which was pretty common up there. It was a great place to grow up. I feel really lucky that I got to grow up there.
Lisa Belisle: That’s where the former airbase was.
Tina Wilcoxson: Yes. Yeah. That was really nice because we were probably the most diverse school in the state really even though we were way up there because we had kids from other countries and kids that lived all over the place. It was interesting. It was nice. I’m really glad that I had that experience.
Lisa Belisle: How did you find your way down to southern Maine and then out to New Mexico? What was the path there?
Tina Wilcoxson: Well, I went to college in Orono, and I had worked in the Bangor area for a little bit. I was actually in pharmaceutical sales, of all things. I did that for about a year. I decided I didn’t like that very much, and I took a job in Bar Harbor waitressing while I was trying to figure out what I was going to do. The woman I worked for, she and her husband owned a restaurant. She was a massage therapist, and one day I was helping in the kitchen prepping, and I pulled my back. I was lifting a five gallon bucket of pickles and thought it was empty, and it was full.
Anyways, she gave me a massage, and that was the first time I ever really even knew that such a thing existed. By the end of the summer I decided I was going to go to massage therapy school. It was a great school. We learned a lot about, as I said, herbal nutrition, herbal supplements, massage, polarity therapy. When I came back to Maine I wanted to use that while I was trying to build up a massage practice and just started working at the health food stores. That’s how I ended up there.
Lisa Belisle: I remember when Royal River Natural Foods was actually in Yarmouth. I think it was before that building turned into a Napa Auto Parts, and now it’s Maple’s Gelato. It was kind of a funky little space, and it was at a time where we were past the ’70s when health food stores were in their heyday, and we had not quite gotten to the place we are now where I feel like people are very interested in health and nutrition. It was kind of that interim space. It was interesting to me to know that this was located in this little suburb, this little town. Were you working there during that time?
Tina Wilcoxson: Our first store was actually even smaller than where Maple’s is now. It was in the little strip mall next to Romeo’s in Yarmouth.
Lisa Belisle: Right. I actually remember that too. That’s interesting. That was very far, very long ago.
Tina Wilcoxson: Yeah. When I first began working for Royal River, that’s where I started. Then not long after I started working, Ruth bought the building where in Maple’s is, and we moved in there. The first store was so small. When I think about it, I don’t know how we managed. The back room was the size of a closet. Then when we moved to the other space, we felt like we had so much room, and we were able to really expand. We could have customers come in and actually do their grocery shopping instead of doing just one little thing here, one little thing there. It was a lot of fun. It was fun to be part of that process. We really were independent. We didn’t really have any other groups or organizations at the time that we could belong to, so we were really trying to find our own way for most of it. Now, I feel like there’s some more support for independents, which is nice because you have other people you can talk to and commiserate with, or celebrate with. That’s nice.
Lisa Belisle: The space that you’re in now in Freeport is a very good size actually. What I’ve noticed over the years of going there is that you’re not just sitting back on your laurels. You’re continuing to evolve it. The new produce case that you installed, it’s beautiful, and shiny, and efficient. You walk right in the door, and one of my favorite things, I think, about your store is that right there is the produce. The mangos are talking to you, and the grapes, and the berries. I think that’s one of the things that I’ve always liked about the independent stores is they put out there these really very options, and they make them appealing.
Tina Wilcoxson: Yeah. We take a lot of pride in our produce. It’s a reason that a lot of people come to us because they really like our produce. Kind of a funny story, someone that used to be a produce manager at our store, she had moved away and come back, and she was interviewing for a job at Wild Oats in Portland. In part of her interview process they said, “Okay, go up to the produce section, and do some culling, and tell us what you would take out, which doesn’t look good.” She did her thing. When they came back and saw her bucket full of stuff, they said “Oh, your standards are way too high.” She didn’t get the job, but we thought that was pretty funny. We do take a lot of pride in our produce, and it’s important to us. We only carry organic. We made that commitment a long time ago. I think customers really appreciate it. For one thing, it’s easy. They know everything is organic there. They’re not having to read the label. It’s important to us.
Lisa Belisle: I also notice that it used to be when we got organic food that, especially produce, that there wasn’t necessarily the selection, and they didn’t have the greenhouses now that people are using to grow year-round. There was a lot of ugly fruit and twisted roots. I don’t really mind that. That doesn’t really bother me, but it was more of that than not. Your stuff, really, as I said, it’s kind of like the store has upped its game. Do you think that that is similar to what’s going on industry-wide? When it comes to organic produce, I mean.
Tina Wilcoxson: Yeah. I think there are more options for organic than there used to be 20 years ago when I was starting. There are a lot more farms. In Maine we have really an embarrassment of riches when it comes to that. We’re so lucky. If you go to other states, they just don’t have that. They don’t have as many farms. They don’t have as much access to choices, to natural food choices or independent retailers at all. There is a lot more selection. Also with the increase in hoop houses and hydroponics, we are able to get local produce for a lot longer part of the season, which is great because then it’s fresh. It’s just coming from right down the road.
Lisa Belisle: It’s also fun, I find, to go into your store, and other independents, but because your store is my store, it’s where I usually go. There’s little fun products that I see. We interviewed the woman who created LooHoo, the little balls for the dryer.
Tina Wilcoxson: Oh, yeah.
Lisa Belisle: I just thought, “How great is it that I can go into this store that’s small enough so you would worry that maybe the selection wasn’t so great, but it also makes it possible that there’s little fun and creative products that you can run into. “
Tina Wilcoxson: Right. Yeah. We carry her product. I use that myself. I haven’t done a check recently, but last time I checked, we purchase from about 200 Maine farms, producers, people that make the dryer balls, or it could be laundry detergent, herbal teas. That really makes us different, but it’s also a lot more fun for us because we get to work with a bunch of different people, who are really passionate about what they do. It gives us some good variety and just makes it a much more interesting store for us who work there, as well as for people who shop there. That’s a high priority for us, to buy as much as we can from Maine companies.
Lisa Belisle: The people that work at your store also seem to have a pretty high level of knowledge about what they are selling. When I go in and I’m looking for echinacea, or elderberry, or fish oil, or some supplement, there are people that work in your store who are able to say, “Here is a very high quality version of that. This is the direction I might go in.” You have books that are available for references. It’s impressive because that kind of knowledge is important.
Tina Wilcoxson: It is important. It’s very important. People have a lot of access to information now than they used to when we first started. You can go on the internet and get too much information, really, but, for example, Becky, who works in our supplement department, for the last couple summers I’ve had her go to Avena Botanicals and take some courses. It’s active learning in a way, and you’re really getting to learn about a lot of other properties of herbs that you might not know by just reading a book, or get to hear from Deb Soule’s experience, who she’s been an herbalist. I think that company’s been around for 30 years. That’s important.
For me that’s where I started out working when I first started in the store, and I really enjoyed that part, getting to work with people one-on-one. You can have some pretty intimate conversations with people when you’re in a store, which is unusual. I loved that. I really loved that. I still love that because occasionally I’ll fill in if someone’s on a break or on vacation. It’s one of the things I really like, is working with people one-on-one. I don’t think you get that in a lot of stores, so that’s important to us to have someone in that department as much as possible to help people.
Lisa Belisle: It’s useful to me also as a doctor because I will suggest that…. For example, beet juice is good for high blood pressure, and I know that there’s not that many places that have beet juice. Your store has it, and so I feel really comfortable, and I know it’s high quality beet juice, so i feel really comfortable saying to a patient, “Okay. You don’t want to take a medication? I’m completely behind that. Beet juice seems to work really well, and here’s where you can get it.” I feel good that I’m sending them to a place where if they have questions, they can ask, or if they have something else they’d like to get, they can find it there.
Tina Wilcoxson: Right. Yeah. We get a lot of referrals, and I really appreciate that, thank you, from a lot of different physicians, or chiropractors, or other therapists. I do, and I think a lot of people that work there try to take the whole approach. If someone comes in looking for a certain supplement, ask them some questions about their diet or what they might be doing otherwise in their life that could also help in a gentle way. You really need to meet people where they’re at.
Years ago when I was working in the supplement department there was a couple that would come in fairly often. They would have a long list of supplements, and I would try and talk them down a little bit. It was obvious that they were smokers because when you work in a health food store it’s pretty obvious when someone comes in, but I didn’t mention that. Over time we get a relationship and formed a relationship, so then I felt comfortable where I could say, “You know, have you thought about maybe quitting smoking? That would probably do a lot more for you than just buying supplements.”
They were very open and receptive. Obviously they had thought about it and were working on it. Then it was so exciting because they came back to me, I don’t know, a few months later, and they said “We quit smoking. We haven’t had….” It was really exciting to be a part of that and share that with them. It’s important to, well, and I know that you believe this as well, to look at the whole picture and not try and just treat one thing.
Lisa Belisle: I’m interested in this idea of an independent store like yours also needing to balance the books and make profits.
Tina Wilcoxson: Right, yeah.
Lisa Belisle: People often feel very mission-driven, which is wonderful. Obviously the mission, the whole person, the high quality produce is great, and then there’s also the balancing of the books. Your store has actually been recognized as doing a good job with that.
Tina Wilcoxson: Oh, thank you. Yeah. That’s the behind the curtain non-exciting part, counting the beans. I prioritize where the money goes that we do bring in, and I want to pay farmers a fair price, what they’re asking. If a farm comes to us and tells us they can sell us something for something, then that’s what we pay them. We don’t try to negotiate them down, and I always want to prioritize benefits for my staff. My intention when I bought the business was that I wanted to be able to run it the same way Ruth did and I wanted to be able to be as generous an owner as she was. Otherwise I wasn’t going to do it. I had been doing the bookkeeping for several years, and I’m like, “Okay. This can be done. There are places you can save.” The places I think about saving are electricity, and how you’re going to heat the building, and things like that that aren’t going to be affecting my staff or the customers. It is a juggling act sometimes, but I like it.
Lisa Belisle: You seem to have done a good job with your staff because I’ve noticed some longitudinality.
Tina Wilcoxson: Yeah. We have a lot of staff that have been there 10 years or longer. I’ve been there 20 years. There are a couple of people that have been there for 17 years, 18. I think they’re going on 18 years. Five or six that are 10 years or more. That’s the other thing. I wanted to have a place where people want to stay, and I can give them good benefits and good pay, and it’s a fun place to work. That’s good for us, and it’s also great for the customers to see the same faces. There is some turnover. You hire some young people like your daughter’s friend, and they go off to school. You want to see them do that even though we hate to see them go. They usually come back.
Lisa Belisle: Well, that leads me to my next question, which is actually… I think two of my daughter’s friends, and my daughter’s 20, she’s a junior in college, I think two of them worked for you in the last couple of years. I know that one of them is planning to go to naturopathic school, so she’s doing a lot of background courses in that. It’s interesting to me that this generation, they are very aware. One of my daughter’s roommates is vegan, so they do a lot of vegan cooking and looking into the health benefits of certain foods. Her good friend that we’re talking about, she, I believe, also is a vegan, but definitely has some food sensitivities. She’s very aware of that sort of thing. I love this because I have literally been trying to get my kids interested in this for their entire lives, but I think it’s somehow a little different when it’s coming from mom and maybe even harder coming from mom who is a doctor. I think a lot of it, when it comes from the peers, somehow it makes more sense.
Tina Wilcoxson: Yeah. Well, it always means more when they discover it on their own. With my husband, he’s a really good cook, and he eats well, and when I would bring food home, first of all it was always that it tasted better. That was one way to get him into it. Then he just started really embracing organic and non-GMO. It was cute because he would read something, and he’d get really excited about it and start talking to me about it. I would just smile, and nod, and listen, and be like “Yay. Yeah. Yeah,” as if I’d never heard it before. Then one day he called me up and said, “Can you bring home some cornstarch?” I said, “Yeah, don’t we have cornstarch at the house?” because we’d probably use a teaspoon a year. He goes “Yeah, but it’s not organic. It might have GMOs in it.” I said “I think I’ve created a monster.”
Lisa Belisle: Well, it’s a good kind of monster.
Tina Wilcoxson: It is a good kind of monster.
Lisa Belisle: Definitely, I’m down with that kind of monster.
Tina Wilcoxson: He had to come to that on his own. It meant a lot more to him on his own than it did me telling him. That’s the same approach, I think, to take with customers that come in, like I was saying, meet them where they’re at and get them to try a few things. Then maybe they’ll want to try a few more things. Then they’ll build from there.
Lisa Belisle: Is it interesting to you that you began your life associated with a farm and now you’re in this part of your life and you’re affiliated with farmers?
Tina Wilcoxson: I know. Yeah. I didn’t think it would… It’s come full circle. I’m not farming, but I do get to work with the farms, and that’s one of my favorite parts of my job is talking with the farmers. We have some real characters that come to the store with some really great stories. I didn’t realize, I think, how much I missed being in a farm community until I started working with farmers again and getting to talk with them. I don’t know. I have a hard time to describe it, but growing up in a farm community where most people were farming, especially around harvest time, it was just the whole town was in it together. You don’t really get that chance a lot, I don’t think, when the whole town is really pulling together for something. Oftentimes, unfortunately, you see that happen, the whole town pulling together, and it’s around a tragedy. This was the whole town pulling together around something good. I still get that. I get to have a little bit of that now in a different way.
Lisa Belisle: I guess my last question is one of the things that I used to notice about, I’ll call them “natural food stores” because that’s what they used to be called, and yours is still called that….
Tina Wilcoxson: Yes, yeah.
Lisa Belisle: But small independent stores like yours was that some people went because there was a sense of fear about what was in the world, that the food that they had was bad, and there were chemicals. I would sense that people were escaping and taking refuge. Now what I sense, and not everybody, obviously….
Tina Wilcoxson: Right. Yeah.
Lisa Belisle: But now what I sense is that people are in the stores, and there are still people who are in the stores because they are fearing something, and they’re trying to go away from something, but now what I see are people who are trying to go towards something, that people are saying, “Oh, well if I try to buy food that’s organic and doesn’t have GMOs in it, then it’s going to bring me better health. It’s not like I’m avoiding it because it could make me sick and die.” It’s more like “I want to live my life fully. I want to savor. I want to grab hold.”
Tina Wilcoxson: Yeah. That’s a great perspective. I think you’re right. I think another big part of it, too, is with a lot of the independent stores especially, as I was saying, where we do carry a lot of Maine products, people in Maine are very proud of being from Maine and want to support Maine products. I think that’s another reason that drives people into the store, knowing that they can buy a lot of things from Maine vendors. I had someone in the store recently from… I forget where she was from. It might have been Pennsylvania. I was speaking with her after she was done shopping, and she goes, “You people in Maine are kind of really into Maine, aren’t you?” She was now noticing some of the names of the companies had a lot of, a lot of the companies have “Maine” in the name. I said “Yeah. Yeah, we are.”
Lisa Belisle: Why do you think that is?
Tina Wilcoxson: Well, it’s a great place. I love Maine. I can’t imagine being anywhere else. I love all the seasons. It’s beautiful. I think the people are beautiful and wonderful. It’s a great place to live.
Lisa Belisle: What have you learned over the last three years of being the owner of this business and having this ultimate responsibility?
Tina Wilcoxson: Yeah. Ooh. I have a few more gray hairs. What have I learned? It took me a little while to really take ownership, I guess, of being the owner, I think, because I’d been there so long and worked with and still do work with a lot of the people that I was working with before I was the owner. It was a little bit of a fuzzy transition, but I think now I’m starting to feel a little bit more like the owner. I was always invested before. Ruth always helped us all feel like we were really kind of part owners. Now if I have an idea, then I just get to do it, like this summer with the new produce case and the new… I can get a little carried away sometimes. I get going on a project, and some of the staff are like, “Tina’s got a hammer in her hand. What’s going on?” I’ve really gotten a lot of fun out of it, and I feel reinvigorated I would say.
Lisa Belisle: What do you want the next five to ten years to look like for your store?
Tina Wilcoxson: Well, my vision and my hope is that we’re really a haven for people. I want customers to work in and feel comfortable, to feel welcome, to feel at ease, to come in and go, “Oh, this is a nice, relaxed place. I like this place.” I want to continue to make that happen on a daily basis for people, and I want to continue to do well so that I can provide well for my staff and my community and charitable givings, and help be, I guess, a voice in the community as well for healthy eating and healthy living. There are a lot of voices, which I’m very thankful for.
Lisa Belisle: Well, I appreciate your taking over the business three years ago, and I appreciate all the time that you’ve spent building the business over the last 20 years. For people who are interested, Royal River Natural Foods is located in Freeport, and we will also put links on our show notes page. I’ve been speaking with Tina Wilcoxson, who grew up on a farm in northern Maine and now has worked her way up through the ranks to become the owner of Royal River Natural Foods in Freeport. Thanks so much for all the work that you do, and thanks for coming in today.
Tina Wilcoxson: Thank you so much for having me.
Lisa Belisle: You have been listening to Love Maine Radio show number 277, natural foods from local farms. Our guests have included Nate Drummond, Gabrielle Gosselin, and Tina Wilcoxson. For more information on our guests and extended interviews, visit LoveMaineRadio.com. Love Maine Radio is downloadable for free on iTunes. For a preview of each week’s show, sign up for our e-newsletter and like our Love Maine Radio Facebook page. Follow me on Twitter as DoctorLisa, and see my running, travel, food, and wellness photos as Bountiful1 on Instagram. We love to hear from you, so please let us know what you think of Love Maine Radio. We welcome your suggestions for future shows. Also, let our sponsors know that you have heard about them here. We are privileged that they enable us to bring Love Maine Radio to you each week. This is Dr. Lisa Belisle. I hope that you have enjoyed our natural foods from local farms show. Thank you for allowing me to be part of your day. May you have a bountiful life.
Speaker 1: Love Maine Radio is made possible with the support of Berlin City Honda, The Rooms by Harding Lee Smith, Maine Magazine, Portland Art Gallery, and Art Collector Maine. Audio production and original music have been provided by Spencer Albee. Our editorial producer is Paul Koenig. Our assistant producer is Shelbi Wassick. Our community development manager is Casey Lovejoy, and our executive producers are Kevin Thomas, Rebecca Falzano, and Lisa Belisle. For more information on our hosts, production team, Maine Magazine, or any of the guests featured here today, please visit us at LoveMaineRadio.com.