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AWESOME Kate Ross LeBlanc, co-founder and CEO of Saje Natural Wellness, has mastered the art of aligning her passion, time and resources to make the world a better place. Now, the inspiring entrepreneur is sharing how she did it. | by INGRIE WILLIAMS “THE JOURNEY TOWARD SAJE NATURAL WELLNESS
was a dual quest,” says the BC-based co-founder and CEO Kate Ross LeBlanc. It began 20 years ago, when her husband and co-founder, Jean-Pierre LeBlanc, was searching for holistic solutions to deal with residual pain from a car accident, while she was eager to explore her inherent passion for retail. Having grown up in her mother’s fabric store in smalltown Ontario, she had vivid memories of poring over pattern books and being wowed by the textures and colours on bolts of material. “I was young – six or seven years old – and I think I was very stimulated to create a beautiful retail environment,” she says. “I’d go to textile mills in eastern Canada with my mom and do buying. I thought this whole idea of how things were selected and then bought and shared with consumers was the most exciting thing that had ever happened. In some part of my mind, I wanted to relive that experience.” Ross LeBlanc was also fascinated by smell: “From a world marketing perspective that it’s a very underutilized sense. Jean-Pierre and I were both in a seeking mode, and when we discovered the healing power of essential oils, it really was a big aha moment. He began formulating prod-
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ucts for his own health – he has a chemistry background – and I started to formulate the idea where we could share these healing modalities with the larger world.” Peppermint Halo, their first product, perfectly encapsulates their mission. Housed in a sleek glass roller ball vial, the invigorating blend works to banish headaches at first whiff and remains a bestseller today. It can also be found in Pocket Pharmacy, a popular set of travel-friendly remedies for everything from stressed shoulders to tummy woes. The newest launch is a collection of nourishing shampoos that joins the collection of gender-neutral offerings that are made using only 100 percent natural, plant-derived ingredients.
COMMUNITY CENTRE An eye for award-winning store aesthetics wasn’t the only thing that Ross LeBlanc gleaned from her early days in her mother’s store. “She was very big on creating community – that great feeling that you wanted to be there because you were going to get to connect with other people,” she says. With a rapidly growing company that boasts numerous locations across Canada and a focus on international expansion, Ross LeBlanc believes that two besthealthmag.ca
