Honest Work: Eileen Schaeffer and a Mission to Help us Heal Ourselves

By: Cynthia Adams | Photos By: Nancy Evelyn

As living proof, there is rich Georgia Clay under Schaeffer’s efficiently short fingernails.

Eileen Schaeffer strides into the room with brio, her face wreathed in smiles. She wears dusty cutoff overalls, and her light brown hair is tucked into a worn Patagonia cap.

It is seriously hot, even by Georgia summer standards, and rivulets of sweat work down her neck as she tries to dust herself off.

The Bohemian look isn’t just for fashion’s sake, but practical. Schaeffer has just left working herbs in the fields at UGArden, a place she loves and where she works “whenever possible.”

As half of the Herb Girls Athens partnership, formed with fellow UGA alum Amy Wright, Schaeffer is also
working vigorously to grow their business. As holistic health consultants, both are involved in education while developing and producing herbal products with a shared vision.

In March 2019, the Herb Girls earned top honors for their agricultural entrepreneurship at a UGA competition called FABricate.

“I was always ambitious. It’s my best and my worst trait,” Schaeffer laughs. “I have found I love the entrepreneurial life, because it allows me to use all my skills. Working with herbs make me feel better than anything has.”

She adds seriously, “Graduating with a masters in agribusiness is such a feat for me.”

Shaeffer and Wright were awarded the $2,500 grand prize after their pitch for a coffee supplement (called Rally coffee) at the UGA Student Center for Entrepreneurship’s College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences competition. The flavorful anti-oxidant supplement created by Herb Girls “boosts the anti-inflammatory benefits of coffee, supports the adrenals, and contains cardamom, chicory and cinnamon for gut health and flavor,” says Schaeffer.

“I’ve been blown away by all the gifts, and access to funding, all from UGA,” says Schaeffer.

The second-place FABricate winner was a collection of beer-infused barbecue sauces made by Classic City Sauces produced by undergraduate students Blake Carter, Coleman Purcell and Tristan Smith.

According to Professor Caesar Escalante, who teaches in the Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics where Schaeffer was in the Master of Agribusiness program, they were all singular students and achievements. The FABricate event honored them “as student-run businesses, able to successfully combine classroom and real-world educational experiences.”

He adds, “In the past five years, I’ve had great students, but not so many entrepreneurs.”

Schaeffer has since completed her master’s program. Understanding the market demand for herbs is part of her knowledge pursuit, she explains. “There is no program like it (UGA’s) in the Southeast.”

“Historically, people think of conventional agriculture when they hear agribusiness,” she says regarding the agribusiness certification. “But I’m able to study herb production in the Southeast.”

HERBALIST AND HEALER

“I’m hot,” Schaeffer admits, plopping down unceremoniously. “But it’s cool UGA was so open in allowing me to study medicinal herb awareness.” Then she grins cheekily.

There is garden dirt beneath Schaeffer’s short clipped nails, and a new wedding ring on her left hand. She is newly married, as of last summer, to musician Andrew Brantley. Brantley is co-founder of the vintage rock band The Orange Constant.

Schaeffer lights up talking about her loves—her new partner, Brantley, organics, and farming.

Still sweaty from relentless sun while in the fields, she is profusely apologetic about the dust. “I’m sorry,” she grins. “No time to go home and shower.”

Schaeffer is trying as best she can to cool down, fanning herself energetically. She gives the impression of endless energy, the proverbial dynamite in a small package. Yet she is simultaneously Zen-like in her self awareness.

“Be where your feet are present,” the herbalist and healer exhorts.

Schaeffer says she doesn’t look too far in the future and journals religiously.

“In 10 years, I would love to be financially stable through my work with herbal medicine. I would like for that to be my full-time job and teach all over. And, continue making great products…and see people accepting herbal medicine.”

She has followed many divergent paths to pursue this goal. She studied ecology and religion and used her art abilities to illustrate several children’s books before shifting her focus to self-healing and nutritional therapies. “I’m an artist by trade, and make botanical art T-shirts and postcards.”

Schaeffer worked with herbs via AmeriCorps’s Vista program in the Urban Green Lab soon after receiving an undergraduate degree at Sewanee University of the South. While in Vista, she worked with green education in schools and had a period of self-discovery.

“I wanted more structure.”

Before moving to Asheville, NC, Schaeffer earned a certificate in permaculture design, and became a master gardener.

When living and studying in Asheville, she was diagnosed with IBS, a digestive disorder connected to modern diet and stress.

The diagnosis was an added incentive to learn more about her own wellness and furthered Schaeffer’s holistic interests. Now the need was personal.

“In Asheville I learned more about herbal medicine, and saw it as the connection to health, and did a program (for holistic herbalists) at the Blue Ridge School of Herbal Medicine.”

As a result, she is steeped in the healing aspects of organics and the natural world, and wants more people to eat well, ditch sugar, and grow as much of their food and herbs as possible.

Schaeffer came to Athens with her then boyfriend (now husband), whose band is based there.

In Athens, she began working at Herbal Remedy and met Wright, now her partner in Herb Girls. “I wanted to teach people how to cook with them. It was an educational outreach. People wanted herbal blends and tinctures.”

Schaeffer also wanted something much deeper: for our culture to take wellness and their environment personally. “When I’m just observing people, I’m blown away by how many people don’t recycle and how much sugar is eaten.”

Pills will not fix those ills, she says.

“Modern medicine is so good at what it does, but herbalism and holistic health are another aspect.”

The Franklin, Tenn., native was steeped in her family’s farming background, absorbing her parents’ passion for agriculture.

“I’ve been attracted to herbs since I was a child, but never put the health connection together. I studied ecology and butterflies…and saw how things are truly connected.”

Schaeffer continues working at UGArden, “a student-run place,” as she describes it, under PhD student Noel Joy Fuller.

She is self-aware, and laughs about being way too thrifty and practical.

“I’m like a gypsy woman. I don’t waste anything. I will compost everything. Being on the side of growing food, I have such an aversion to wastefulness.”

Yet it underscores another kind of awareness, which is in tandem with healing the planet. “My biggest other goal is to make people fall in love with herbs and heal their bodies.”

As mentioned before, Schaeffer and Wright “wanted to teach people how to cook with herbs, and recognized they wanted herbal blends and tinctures. All of this was going on while I was applying to the graduate program. I somehow had a deep sense that this would help further my entrepreneurial ideas.”

The Herb Girls host popular bitters workshops, lead community herb walks, and teach evening classes involving the integration of herbs into diet and detoxifying from sugar. That program is named “Restart.”

ENHANCING HEALTH

“Bitters were my gateway into the herbal world,” Schaeffer explains. “We have five tastes; bitter is the only taste with receptors all over your body. It simulates the rest and relax state.”

Digestive Bitters: Restoring Healthy Digestion Bitter is an uncommon flavor that has largely disappeared from our modern palate. Bitter foods and herbs were a common part of the ancestral diet, with huge benefits to body and mind. Herbal bitters are an old medicine remedy for what seems to be an ever increasing problem, weak digestion. Digestive bitters stimulate bitter receptors on the tongue, stomach, gallbladder and pancreas. Their primary effect is to promote digestive juices such as stomach acid, bile and enzymes to break down food and assist in the absorption of nutrients. https://lifestylemarkets.com/blog/10-benefits-of-digestive-bitters/

She carries bitters with her wherever she goes, which typically contain ginger and cinnamon.” When her uncle developed gout, Schaeffer says “He used a tincture of celery seed.”

The outcome was amazing; he was quickly converted to holistic possibilities. “It’s like, click!”

After seeking advice from a nutritional therapist in Dahlonega, Ga., Schaeffer sought a means to enhance her own health. Organic products were a component of that healing.

The Herb Girl’s FABricate winner, the Rally coffee supplement, remains a bestseller.

Herb Girls product offerings are rapidly expanding, Schaeffer mentions, now including “a bitter and spice, a warming blend, and a ‘bitter salad in a bottle,’ which we offer through our e-store.”

Herb Girls also produce Take It Easy and Sol Tea blends.

“The gateway (to trying herbal supplementation) is Rally; that’s why we developed it. It’s an adaptogenic blend and getting a ton of hype. They help your body respond to stress better, which over time builds up your immune system.”

Last spring, Rally won $2,500 in prize money from the CAES agribusiness competition, FABricate. Eileen Schaeffer teamed up with partner Amy Wright to create an anti-inflammatory coffee supplement. “The supplement has become a steady seller,” says Schaeffer.

Yet personal products have become a part of the Herb Girls brand and extended their market reach.

“We also make and sell mulling spices, bath bombs, and an organic, safe sunscreen, SPF BFF, our bestseller, which was award-winning at the American Herbalist Guild Symposium in Helen, Ga.”

She frowns slightly. “Like the saying, I’m a jack of all trades and master of none, but I think you have to be a master of all trades.”

Then Schaeffer springs up out of her chair, off to prepare orders for Herb Girls. The entrepreneurs are ready to rally!