Expert in Essential Oils, Robert Seidel, Explains How He Became a Success

How did I get into essential oils? Well, it began many years ago when I was in forestry school. I was studying forest technology and resources management at New York State Ranger School and I came upon a tree called a balsam fir.

The balsam fir has blisters on the bark and when you pop the blisters this gorgeous resin comes out, just an incredibly wonderful smelling resin. I spent time asking my teachers and professors if there was any way I could isolate the aroma. This was back in the sixties and we were in forestry school and forestry was all about making wood, lumber and paper. So, I was repeatedly told that there is no way to isolate that gorgeous essence. Of course, what that did was, it caused me to study to find out if there was a way and I actually did eventually.

I continued my forestry career at Paul Smith’s College, New York State Ranger School, and Syracuse University then I moved out west here working with the wood industry and I started building my own distillation units. I started with a small pot and pan, a condenser from an air conditioner in a car, and I did it on the stove and I was cooking douglas fir. And that worked. I used a fan to cool down my condenser and I sprayed it with water. Eventually, I started building bigger units and extracting essential oils and it was really wonderful.

So, I started my business, we’re experiencing our 46th anniversary this year. I started my business dealing in essential oils 46 years ago. Now, if you can imagine, this is before the internet. How would you find somebody that say, produces rose oil and you’re in Portland, Oregon?

Well, what I did was, I spent lots of time at university libraries going through telephone books, international telephone books. I started making telephone calls around the world and I actually found people who were producing essential oils and I started buying from those people, putting the oils in small bottles, and reselling it. This was a concept that really, back in 1977, was in its infancy. There maybe was maybe one or two other companies that were doing just that.