Saturday, March 21, 2009
Friday, March 13, 2009
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Natural Products Expo West 2009! Great Show!
From Garden of Life with Jordan Rubin to a Fashion show for the Eco-friendly fashion, Expo West was a great show! The Organic Center held their annual dinner and we were asked to supply the salt for the table along with an organic pepper. Judy Brooks, Jordan Rubin, and even Prince Charles of England made an appearance in some form. The PR opportunities were endless and we are proud to have Ty Stevens on our team as our new "PR guy." Thanks Ty!
Saturday, March 7, 2009
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Small Business of the Year 2008 - Runner Up
Owner Takes It With A Grain
Selina Guerra was just 17 when she boarded a bus for the West Coast, eager to see the world outside her hometown of Indianapolis. In Chico, Calif., she and a friend were carrying a couch from a Goodwill store to their tiny apartment when a guy pulled up and asked if they needed help. Two years later, she and Philippe DeLangre wed.The following year - 1979 - she began working for her father-in-law, a pioneer in macrobiotics, a dietary regimen that eschews processed foods. He had started The Grain and Salt Society® to sell its Celtic Sea Salt® Brand sea salt, harvested on the coast of Brittany, France. But he ran the mail-order business as more of a passion than a moneymaking venture. She saw more potential in it.
That same year, she bore a son with cerebral palsy, causing her to embrace her father-in-law's ideas about nutrition as she explored alternative treatments. After he died in 1993, she and her husband bought the business for $150,000. French-speaking Philippe became its president and coordinated the salt purchases. As vice president, she focused on marketing and networking with influential people in the health-food industry such as nutritionists, doctors, chefs and authors.
"I promoted them in my newsletter and catalog, and they promoted me in their product lines and ingredient formulations. We grew together."
She tired of California and, after researching other places, took a shine to Asheville, where they moved the company and incorporated it as Celtic Ocean International in 1996. It continued to grow, shipping salt to stores across the U.S., including the Earth Fare, Whole Foods and Wild Oats chains. They expanded the catalog to include organic grains, healthy-lifestyle books, green teas and skin-care products.
But as the company grew, their marriage crumbled: Working together and raising a handicapped child had taken its toll. Divorced in 1999, they engaged in a long, nasty battle over the business, reaching an agreement four years later. She bought him out for $600,000, borrowed from her father, who owned some service stations. "To this day, I feel a little guilty because it was his father's business. But I needed the company's resources for my children." A year later, she moved its headquarters to an 18,000-square-foot building in nearby Arden. A few weeks before the move, rain caused flooding that destroyed $487,000 of equipment and inventory, including 24 new computers. A friend let her use some storage space. "My staff managed to contact all the vendors and had them overnight as much inventory as possible to help us fulfill our orders. Somehow we did it. I almost had a heart attack, but we pulled through."
But the trials of a small-business owner continued. During the last five years, DeLangre, now 50, has spent more than $300,000 to fight brand infringement. Her most costly battle came last year with Clinton, Mich.-based Eden Foods, which contended that Celtic sea salt is a generic term. "That case cost me $92,000," she says. Finally, they settled. "But it showed other companies that I will spend money and fight to protect my brand"
Last year, the company began doing business as Selina Naturally", which she feels better represents the range of products it now offers, including salt from Portugal and Hawaii, herbs, almonds, olive oil and beauty products. Celtic Sea Salt® Brand still generates about 70% of revenue.
Growth has slowed in recent years as large retailers such as Wal-Mart have gotten into the natural-food business. "The market has reached a saturation point. But this just means we've got to work harder to stay ahead."
by Sam Boykin
Monday, March 2, 2009
Family harvesting salt in France
The Delangre ladies spent part of last summer harvesting the salt in Brittany, themselves. This was a great experience in understanding the strenuous yet delicate method used in maintaining the pristine, ancient harvesting technique. In the pictures above they are harvesting the Flower of the Ocean by carefully skimming the very top of the water, making sure to not go even an inch too deep, otherwise the clay from the bed would muddy the soft pink crystals. The ancient Celts used this method for hundreds of years in the Brittany area, instinctively knowing that this was the most sustainable method of extracting the salt from the water for the environment. Each of these salt ponds had their own little eco system complete with beautiful brine and seaweed. The air smelled fresh, salty and sweet! The hard work was worth every moment when you tasted the fresh pink Flower of the Ocean just seconds out of the pond. The pink hue and floral scent of the Flower of the Ocean took on this character due to the living plankton. There are only a few places on this planet that still have the beauty and life in a natural healthy seasoning.
Professionals who support Celtic Sea Salt
Dr. Christiane Northrup
Christiane Northrup, MD, obstetrician/gynecologist, is an empowering, internationally known visionary in women’s health and wellness. As a practicing physician for over twenty years, Dr. Northrup is a leading proponent of medicine and healing that acknowledge the unity of the mind and body, as well as the powerful role of the human spirit in creating health.
Garden of Life®
With the health of our nation at a point of crisis, now is the time to take charge of your personal health and wellness. Garden of Life's vision is to change the way people eat and view nutrition. "From the soil to you, we offer only high quality whole food nutritional supplements. We are committed to giving consumers the tools they need to manage their health and healing at the highest level." quote from Jordan Rubin, Garden of Life Founder & Author of The Maker's Diet.
Mineral Content Comparison Chart
Sea the Difference
Check out how other sea salts on the market compare in their mineral content to Celtic Sea Salt and Selina Naturally Sea Salt.
Selina Hand Picking Salt Flats
Selina Delangre hand picks each salt flat in Portugal for her Selina Naturally Portuguese sea salt line, ensuring the quality and sourcing of her products
Natural Products Expo West 2009
Selina Naturally and Celtic Sea Salt will not be exhibiting at Expo West this year. We are focusing more intentionally on our Public Relations and media contacts, so Selina and Carla Delangre will be attending and scouting for specific connections. Friday night's VIP dinner will be seasoned with Celtic Sea Salt!
The pictures above are from 2008. Richard Green from Air America and Deidra Hall from Days of Our Lives is in the second photo with Selina Delangre.
http://www.expowest.com/ew09/public/enter.aspx
Weston A Price Conference Nov.08
Carla Delangre exhibited with Jean Richardson, CEO of Gold Mine at the Weston A Price Conference in San Francisco, CA. Dr. David Brownstein, author of Salt Your Way to Health, spoke at the conference. This was a great show with wonderful feedback from faithful customers and new standing fans of Celtic Sea Salt!
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
2009 Fancy Food Show San Francisco
January of 2009 Carla Delangre exhibited at the Fancy Food Show in San Francisco. Carla is the granddaughter of the founder of Celtic Sea Salt and daughter of the founder of Selina Naturally.
This was a great show, full of diverse products and attendees.
Thank you Gold Mine and Japanese Delight for your generosity and support at the show.
Selina Naturally™ Innovation Driven By Inspiration
Over 30 years ago, Grain & Salt Society® founder Jacques DeLangre created the Celtic Sea Salt® Brand to share with the world the great taste and health-promoting qualities of this truly exceptional salt. As an innovative researcher in the field of natural health care, Jacques devoted his life to searching for the keys that unlock the potential for health that exists in all people.
Jacques was encouraged by his teacher, macrobiotic pioneer George Ohsawa, to investigate a special salt that was being harvested in the Brittany region of France. Located on the Northwest Atlantic coast, this area had been a salt producing center for thousands of years. But the availability of cheap commercially-mined salt had decimated the trade of traditional sea salt harvesting, and this unique art had all but died out. Jacques visited the region and invested considerable time in researching the salts nutritional profile and establishing relationships with the few remain plaudiers (salt rakers), who were fortunately masters of their craft.
Jacques had long been fascinated by the Celts, a seafaring people who at one time had settled many of the coastal regions of Europe. Since historians believe that the Celts had inhabited the Brittany region, Jacques chose the name Celtic Sea Salt® Brand for his discovery. Because he was drawn to the romanticized imagery often associated with the Celts, Jacques coined the term "Celtic Method" to describe the region's traditional salt harvesting techniques. The rest, as they say, is history. Not only did Jacques' work serve to invigorate traditional salt harvesting in France, it also created a whole new product category within the natural products industry.
From its very founding, this spirit of innovation driven by inspiration has been central to the vision of The Grain & Salt Society®. Through the years, the product selection has grown and changed, but the organization has remained faithfully committed to exploring cutting-edge health concepts and providing solutions to those seeking optimal health.
A New Brand for a New Day
The latest chapter in our evolution began in late 2007, with the launching of Selina Naturally", a new brand for the company. Grain & Salt Society® President and CEO Selina DeLangre realized that the Celtic Sea Salt® Brand name did not lend itself to the wide variety of products she envisioned the company offering. "The Celtic Sea Salt® Brand name will always be an important part of our identity," Selina said. "But we felt it was time to create a broader umbrella brand that would serve as a platform for offering a wider diversity of healthy products." The Selina Naturally" line was initially launched with two product categories: two new salt varieties (Portuguese and Hawaiian) and herb blends featuring Celtic Sea Salt® Brand.
For long-time readers of A Grain of Salt©, it is perhaps the addition of new salts that is most surprising. Although The Grain & Salt Society® has offered a wide variety of product over the years, the only salt it previously offered was Celtic Sea Salt® Brand. Never being content to rest on past achievements, the organization has invested considerable resources into finding and analyzing other salts that might meet our standards for quality and nutritional content. Selina said, "I have been interested in adding other salts to our line for quite some time, but I wasn't interested in picking up just any salt. It was important that any new salts we added meet the exacting standards that Jacques established when he created the Celtic Sea Salt® Brand."
Something Old
Interestingly, one of the new salts was discovered through a recommendation from one of Selina's associates in the French salt industry. After the creation of Celtic Sea Salt® Brand, interest in French sea salt exploded and suppliers often found it difficult to keep up with demand. The result was a growing interest in salts from other regions that have a history of traditional salt harvesting. One such location is the Algarve region of Portugal, an area where salt has been harvested for over 4,000 years. Historians believe that the Egyptians were probably the first to evaporate seawater to produce salt. They later passed their knowledge on to the Phoenicians, masters of ocean travel who probably brought these early salt-gathering methods to the Portuguese coast. Roman ruins in the Algarve region would seem to indicate that they later produced salt there, and during 1600s it supplied salt to much of Europe.
Through her contact, Selina was fortunate to establish a relationship with Rui Francisco Neves Dias, a fourth generation salter whose family has managed salinas (salt ponds) in the Algarve for over 100 years. Rui's salinas are located near Tavira in the Ria Formosa Natural Park, a pristine wildlife reserve that is home to many species of shellfish and other marine life. This area is also free of pollution and has a high evaporation rate due to the Southern European climate.
Much like Celtic Sea Salt® Brand, Rui's salt is hand-harvested in the traditional manner. The marenotos (salt workers) use gravity and gates to funnel the mineral-rich seawater into smaller and shallower salt pans. As the sun and wind evaporate the water, the marenotos harvest the salt using traditional wooden implements. Unlike hand-harvest salts, sea salt harvested by machines must be washed to remove any contaminants left by the equipment, which removes minerals and nutrients.
Celtic Sea Salt® Brand is well known for its light grey, almost purplish hue. But the salt Rui harvests for Selina Naturally" forms as brilliant, dazzling white crystals. Rui's marenotos' careful hand-harvesting ensures that a thin layer of salt is left on the bottom of the salt pound, forming a natural barrier between the bottom and the salt to be harvested. The high evaporation rate is also thought to play a role, since the crystals form much quicker. With a clean, almost sweet flavor, Selina Naturally" Portuguese Sea Salt is available in course, fine ground, and flor de sal. A finishing salt similar to Flower of the Ocean®, Rui's flor de sal received a Superior Taste Award from the International Taste and Quality Institute.
Something New
While Selina Naturally" Portuguese Sea Salt can trace its lineage back 4,000 years, our Hawaiian Deep Sea Salt is a modern marvel, truly the product of a perfect marriage between nature and technology. This remarkable salt is naturally derived from pristine seawater harvested deep off the coast of Kona, Hawaii, using a sustainable, proprietary method. This technology was developed by Mera Pharmaceuticals, a marine biotechnology company that specializes in discovering and developing nutraceuticals and health food products from the pure, deep Pacific ocean water off the coast of Hawaii.
According to Ken Chowder, a scientist with Mera, their salt comes from sea water extracted 2,500 feet below the surface of the Pacific Ocean. Crowder stated that "this provides the purest sea water available. Storms mix the surface water but there is very little mixing below 2,000 feet, even in the most severe storms."
After harvesting, the water is then pumped into lined ponds which are totally enclosed in pharmaceutically-equipped greenhouses. As the water in the ponds evaporates, the relative humidity in the greenhouse begins to rise, retarding evaporation. In order to aid the drying process, air is continuously circulated using a system of filters and chimney fans, Crowder noted.
But what really excited the Selina NaturallyTM team about this remarkable salt is its extraordinary mineral composition. Selina stated, "With a sodium chloride level of 76.9% and a pH of 10.22%, the nutritional profile of this salt is off the charts." She added, "Its potential health benefits are matched only by its flavor. With a subtle and smooth taste, it is a perfect finishing salt for salads, fruits and most any dish."
And what of the future? In 2008, our story of inspiration and innovation will continue to unfold, bringing more exciting opportunities and discoveries to share with our many friends and readers. Stay tuned!
-By Robert Allison
www.celticseasalt.com
Selina Naturally™ Portuguese Sea Salt
A Tradition of Excellence
Selina Naturally™ Portuguese Sea Salt come from traditional salterns in the protected nature reserves along the coast of Algarve, Portugal. The farming methods are based on a 2,000 year tradition using controlled salt ponds. As the water transforms and the precious crystals form, they are gathered by hand, dried by the sun and wind and carefully packed.
www.celticseasalt.com
Hawaiian Deep Sea Salt from Selina Naturally™
Hawaiian Deep Sea Salt from Selina Naturally™
Naturally-ocurring, Naturally balanced, Bioavailable MineralsMineral-rich sea water is extracted from 2,000 feet below the surface off the coast of Kona and remains untouched and pure through its transformation into sea salt. The volcanic activity that created the Hawaiian island coast along with the naturally self-contained deep sea currents create an unrivaled mineral-rich water.
One of the last pristine environments
Scientist have found that deep sea currents are the coldest and the saltiest waters and they do not readily mix with with other ocean water. Selina Naturally™ Hawaiian Deep Sea Salt contains absolutely nothing other than the extracted pure minerals from the deep, which crystallize in a pharmaceutical grade facility.
Deep and Rich
This special deep sea water contains ionized sodium, ionized chlorine, magnesium, calcium, potassium, and selenium, plus many trace elements such as copper, iron, zinc, manganese and chromium, which are missing from common surface water. Selina Naturally™ Hawaiian Deep Sea Salt is only 76.9% sodium chloride and has an alkalizing pH of 10.22.
Convenient
Hand packaged in ready to use, refillable glass jars with built in grinders. Also available in 8oz bags. Appreciated by gourmets around the world, the natural taste and subtle flavor make it the perfect finishing salt and an ideal compliment to fruits and salads. This salt is great in a grinder, but when used as a whole crystal, it dissolves on the taste buds with a sublime flavor. It is so pure that it is ideal for a neti pot.
www.celticseasalt.com
Herb Blends from Selina Naturally™
Created by an herbalist with a culinary flair, these proprietary blends will feed body, soul & spirit and are sure to become your seasonings of choice. Therapeutic herbs such as astragalus root, and sea weed has been added to these blends to offer beneficial elements while flavoring your dishes.
www.celticseasalt.com
Flower of the Ocean®
Flower of the Ocean® is a natural phenomenon of the salt flats of Northern France. Only when the weather conditions are just right do these small, delicate crystals form naturally on the surface of the salt brine. Look closely at this naturally white salt and you will notice a pink tint that bespeaks its precious character. Flower of the Ocean® has an elegant, complex, delicate flavor balanced with a hint of sweetness. Most people choose to save Flower of the Ocean® as a “finishing” salt (sprinkled over foods just before serving), but it can be used in cooking, or ground and used in baking. Flower of the Ocean® also makes an excellent margarita salt.
www.celticseasalt.com
Fine Ground Celtic Sea Salt®
Celtic Sea Salt® Brand Fine Ground is the same type of salt as our coarser Light Grey Celtic® variety, dried at a low temperature then finely ground. Celtic Sea Salt® Brand Fine Ground has no additives and is not processed in any way beyond drying and grinding. With a flavor subtler than that of the coarser variety, it is an all-purpose shaker salt convenient for use at the table or in baking. Celtic Sea Salt® Brand Fine Ground is the perfect salt for the novice health buff, and is a great way to introduce friends and family to Celtic Sea Salt® Brand.
www.celticseasalt.com
Light Grey Celtic Sea Salt®
Celtic Sea Salt® Brand Light Grey Celtic® is totally unprocessed and hand harvested. It is dried by the sun and the wind, retaining the ocean’s moisture and locking in a vast array of vital trace elements. Celtic Sea Salt® Brand Light Grey Celtic® is a coarse, moist salt that gets a light grey hue from the pure clay sole it is harvested from. There is no comparison, in taste or in health effects, between mineral-rich Celtic Sea Salts® Brand and chemically-treated iodized salts. Celtic Sea Salt® Brand Light Grey Celtic® has a rustic old-world flavor that is more assertive than other salts. Try using it in cooking, for soups and stews, grilling, or grind it with a mortar & pestle or salt grinder.
www.celticseasalt.comCeltic Sea Salt® Brand
Celtic Sea Salt® Brand - The Original Brand - is authentic, unprocessed whole salt from one of the most pristine coastal regions of France. Since 1976, Celtic Sea Salt® Brand has been harvested by the paludiers (salt farmers) of Brittany using a farming method that preserves the purity and balance of ocean minerals.
Celtic Sea Salt® Brand is doctor recommended, more nutritious than table salt, quality certified and has exquisite taste. Use Celtic Sea Salt® Brand for all your cooking and seasoning needs to enrich the taste of your foods while adding vital nutrients to your diet.
www.celticseasalt.com
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