After an awesome Yelp event with Bethany of MavenMade, I did a Yelp search to find a good local supplier of quality essential oils. I called Good Health to give me an idea of what they were located near, but they were not of too much health. They gave me an intersection, but that turned out to not be too valuable because the business is tucked away in a back corner behind a number of other places closer to the road. After much circling around, I finally found it (gps proves useless in these types of scenarios, of course.)
I walked in and was surprised to say that they were pretty bustling in the middle of a weekday afternoon. I was a bit disappointed to find that no one greets guests upon walking in. I did not find the store to be the easiest to navigate at all, despite being fairly small. There was no clear signage, and there were various brands of essential oils displayed in different areas. After finally finding the oils, there were still more oils than the two locked display cases that I saw. Since the cases were locked, I had to wait for one of the busy reps to be free, which was a little annoying. There was, however, a good variety in terms of types of oils and different brands, which was a nice trade-off. Also, there was a nice essential oils chart with the oils in alpha-order, along with their benefits, so I happily perused the chart as I waited. What I liked about Good Health was that they had everything that I needed in theory. However, the downside was that half of the items I wanted were sold out, and the owner was unaware of a couple of the sold out items and pointed me to the item, only to find out that there were no more :(.
Also, I found them to be quite overpriced. What's more, despite having three different brands of essential oils, one of which was on sale for 25% off, the owner very deliberately directed me to the highest price item and did so as if that was all they had. That definitely rubbed me the wrong way. There was no mention of the sale either. I happened to see it on the white board over by the register, the complete opposite side of the room. It seemed like she resented a bit the idea of selling the other lower cost items, but I found that a bit odd since she was not required by anyone to offer anything beyond the high-end Dottera line, which will put you at $30+ a per bottle of essential oil and easily hit as high as $79 a pop. I was looking to try four oils for the first time, so that was not the way I was looking to go at all. Also, I noticed in various essential oil displays misleading tags or prices that had been crossed out by hand with an increased price hand written above that. That was a bit of a turn off too. While the owner was helpful and approachable, I found the overall air of the store was a bit snooty. Good Health is a neighborhood shop in the middle of Brandermill that seems to be well known by those in there area, and there was almost this sense that if you weren't in the know already, fine enough. What part of that attitude was given off by the customers and what part was from the owner, well, the jury is still out on that one.
My final impression is that Good Health has the convenience of being in a suburban location, albeit a difficult-to-find one and having a good variety of brands and types of essential oils, but you may want to call ahead for an inventory check and be specific about which brand you prefer. I would have to say 3.5 stars. I like it, but I can't say that I loved it. A good part just did not feel right. While I really wanted to shop locally, I had a more pleasant experience at Wegman's. Wegman's had everything that I needed by a reputable brand and at a reasonable price. Essential oils are pricey, that's a fact, but I am not looking to leave having spent $300 to just build a repertoire of the basic stuff, not even knowing if any of it will work one bit for me. read more
