Aligning Wellness with the Entrepreneurial Journey

Alana Muller  00:10
Welcome to Enterprise.ing, a podcast from Enterprise Bank & Trust that's empowering business leaders one conversation at a time. Each week, we'll hear from top business professionals about lessons on leadership and entrepreneurship that they've learned along the way. I'm your host, Alana Muller, an entrepreneurial executive leader whose primary focus is to connect, inspire and empower community. We at Enterprise Bank & Trust thank you for tuning in to another episode.

Alana Muller  00:43
Hello, everybody, welcome back to another episode of Enterprise.ing podcast. I have to tell you, as a tea enthusiast, I am especially excited to welcome today's guest. In 2012, Lisa Govro founded Big Heart Tea Co., a tea company on a covert mission to help people feel good through healing herbs and tea. Lisa is trained in Ayurveda, and combines her food medicine and culinary knowledge to create a growing line of herbal blends that taste good and make you feel good.

Alana Muller  01:13
Lisa Govro, founder and CEO of Big Heart Tea Co., welcome to Enterprise.ing podcast.

Lisa Govro  01:18
Thank you.

Alana Muller  01:21
Delighted to have you. Let's get started with a little bit of background on Big Heart Tea Co. I'd love to hear a little bit about the company itself and what was your motivation for starting the company.

Lisa Govro  01:34
Yeah, well, okay. So I don't know if this is the first thing you want to hear out of my mouth, but I kind of started Big Heart because I had a chip on my shoulder. Like, I was a little mad at the health and wellness industry for taking healing herbs and tea, and sort of marketing them exclusively to the health and wellness people who practice yoga or like, are really invested in their health and wellness daily routine. I felt like herbs and tea are like the people's medicine. And so, I created Big Heart as a way to make herbs and tea more accessible and fun. And so we say, we don't take ourselves too seriously,  but we mean serious business.

Alana Muller  02:15
I love that so much — you have no idea. You know, my own company is called "Coffee Lunch Coffee," and I don't drink coffee. That's my own little, you know, inside joke and special secret. But, the idea that I can call tea my wellness medicine is just like the best because it gives me lots of good fodder for why I drink so much tea. So, thank you for that.

Alana Muller  02:36
I know that you built Big Heart Tea Co. with the input of farmers, producers and tea drinkers. How did bringing together the various stakeholders in the tea community, and really all along the value chain, benefit your company? And how did you create trusting relationships along the way?

Lisa Govro  02:53
Yeah, I mean, you know, in business, it's all about relationships. Especially when you're building a small business from the ground up, you really become friends with your vendors and the people that you're working with in the industry. And so when we say like, we talk to like our whole value chain, and make sure that everyone's in agreement, that means a few different things depending on where they are in the value chain.

Lisa Govro  03:15
So like, when we're working with our farmers directly, especially farmers that we're working with that are in India, for example, where there's like a long history of neglect of the value chain or the wage of workers, we have a company policy that we don't negotiate price with farmers on the farm level, like when we're doing a direct trade. So, that means that we generally are paying over market price, and we're paying the farmers what they need — what they need to pay their workers, what they need to steward the land. And, where we do negotiate on prices, is generally logistics. Like when we're working through shipping, that's where that comes in. So, that's how they're included in the value chain. And then like all of our other partners, we kind of like have a roundtable business model where we bring everyone to the table, lay out, sort of, our project or plan and what we're trying to execute, and invite everyone to give input, take that into consideration and that's really a collaborative effort. And, depending on what sort of product we're launching or initiative we're working on, it's definitely a group effort.

Alana Muller  04:22
But that's so, I mean, it's so interesting, and it's so respectful. You don't often hear this notion that we pay the farmers what they need to care for their team, for their land, for the product that they're producing. So that's really a beautiful concept. I know in the introduction I mentioned that you have your own experience in food and sort of medicinal approaches to healing. Can you talk a little bit about your own background and what gave you the information that you needed in order to treat farmers and all of the other stakeholders the way that you do?

Lisa Govro  04:56
I have been raised by… we just celebrated Mother's Day so like, I've just been raised by an amazing family, and my mother and my father are both very empathetic, compassionate people. You know, in childhood, we did have a lot of conversations about, you know, what's happening in the world like news, like the news was discussed at our dinner table. And my mom especially as a yoga teacher, so like when I was growing up in the 80s, like, yoga wasn't really super popular, definitely not as mainstream as it is now. And so I was raised on yogic principles from birth, basically. So, going out into the garden with my mom and picking herbs for tea whenever we would get sick. Our recipe for wellness was to do legs up the wall. So like, it's really just sort of part of my culture, is to live this like yogic lifestyle, which is almost kind of like "do no harm."

Lisa Govro  05:52
But you know, we didn't start the tea company with this mission to have this equitable trade model. Really, when I started, I was just wanting to help promote wellness, to a more mainstream audience. And as I got into the industry, that's when I started realizing all the inequities of the value chain, especially with tea and ingredient sourcing and how there was this big lack of transparency. And so that was sort of our, that was sort of like my "aha moment" for our go-to-market strategy, which is like, "Well, yeah, we're gonna be this like fun, like, cool tea company, but we're also going to add some substance with it by being very transparent in our business model, and leading the most sustainable company as we can." And this was back in 2012, when we first started doing this and we've really grown with the industry and with actually just the market in general. Like, now a lot of our customers or like our larger key accounts, seek us out because they also have benchmarks that they're trying to achieve in how they're being sustainable, and are working equitably in the marketplace. And so that's really how it evolved to where we are today.

Alana Muller  07:08
So Lisa, one of the additional stakeholders that we sort of touched on earlier, but I'd love to dig into a little bit more is the end user or the actual tea drinker. So even as I think about my, my own tea consumption and purchasing habits, I'm wondering, are you able to connect directly with the consumer, the actual end tea drinker? Or are you primarily a B2B2C type of business?

Lisa Govro  07:31
Yeah, we do. We connect with our direct consumer in a variety of ways, one through our e-commerce through direct sales, through social media channels, and then also working with our wholesale accounts, doing activations in store, and meeting with their customers and doing a little bit more customer engagement. Like, for example, this weekend, we're going to… we're sponsoring an event in Kansas City, one of our customers, and we'll be going there and sampling tea and talking to their customers about Big Heart and healing herbs.

Alana Muller  08:02
That's great. So what's cool about that is that you're able to at least get feedback from the end user so that you can find out: is the product what people are looking for, how's that actually benefiting them or impacting their lives? So that's really amazing. As you've engrossed yourself in the tea business over this last decade, or so, has there been any, anything that's been surprising to you? Or what's been the most surprising aspect?

Lisa Govro  08:24
Well, 2020 really rocked, rocked our world and rocked everybody's world. But what we saw was a real shift in consumer consciousness, and to caring a lot more about what we're putting into our bodies. And so people started thinking a little bit more mindfully about the foods that they're consuming, where their foods are coming from, who's making them, what's the origin of their food… really just like asking a lot more questions of the makers and the people that they're doing business with. And so we love that. That's like one of the biggest improvements we've seen in the tea industry. And plus, like the younger generation is just seeking out more natural, lighter flavors, like maybe drifting away from the strong coffee flavors and more to like the decaffeinated herbal blends that Big Heart provides.

Alana Muller  09:16
So nice. That's so great. I want to shift the focus of our conversation a little bit. I love that you referenced your parents and the influence that they've had on your life and how, you know, as you even think about your own childhood, and if you would tell your mama that you weren't feeling well, that she really used a yogic approach to addressing whatever was hurting you. As you think about others in your life, who has made sort of a meaningful impact on you and your career and your personal journey?

Lisa Govro  09:45
Yeah, that's a great question. I'm very lucky to be surrounded by so many amazing women who have surrounded me and helped uplift me, pick me up when I was down and lift me up or, or keep me up when I'm up. But, I would say out of all of them, I made one great connection very early on, a woman, Laura Burkemper, and she's just been my rock. Like she actually has like a ton of expertise in terms of fundraising and marketing and building business. But, she also has become my friend over the years, and we've really shared some really special moments together and have grown together. And, she's really the first person I go to when I'm trying to temperature check something. Maybe not at least asking for advice, but like, "hey, does this sound like it's a real thing? Or not?" You know, like, "should I move forward or not?" kind of thing, just to sort of like, I always like to get her two cents.

Alana Muller  10:40
Isn't it remarkable when we have a friend and mentor somebody in our life who can actually speak truth to us, and what a difference it makes, and that we know, no matter what they say to us, we're not going to get offended, because we know that they care about us, and they're just trying to take care of us and our business. So that's so lovely that you have her in your life, and, frankly, that she has you back. So, that's great. That is great.

Alana Muller  11:02
In terms of other sort of professional advisors, who do you surround yourself with and how have they helped your business grow? So you talked about Laura, are there other advisors that you've engaged?

Lisa Govro  11:12
There is a woman in town, Erin Joy, she studies the intersection of entrepreneurship and mental health. I just started working with her about a year ago, and she's been so huge. She's been so huge to helping me work through, you know, personnel HR issues, to helping me decide, like, what's the next hire to make, to like, even just providing me mental health resources for my own personal well-being. That's been huge. And I surround myself largely, I'm a family person. Like, if I could, I would spend all my time with my eight-year-old daughter, Astrid Louise. So like, I'm typically like, on the weekends with my mom and dad, and my sister and my daughter. And we're all just hanging out having fun, doing something like going to Forest Park or going and picking apples, or just hanging out and enjoying each other's company.

Alana Muller  12:04
Oh, my gosh, there's so many things I want to ask you about. I love that she said that. So first of all, happy, happy for Astrid Louise to have a wonderful mom like you. So that's so fabulous. And I also love that you brought up Erin Joy, who is a good friend of mine, and who has also been on Enterprise.ing podcast. I hope that everybody will go and check out Erin's, Erin's episode, but Erin visits me in Kansas City at least twice a year. And we host networking events for women with the support of Enterprise Bank. So I love that you brought Erin's name up, that's so fabulous. Whether it's from Erin or Laura, or your mom, or anyone, what's the best piece of business advice you've received?

Lisa Govro  12:42
That… and I don't remember who told me this, but I repeat it daily. It's so simple: it's just tea. I just remind myself that all of the time because, I tend to — like many women — overthink things or overanalyze things. But, at the end of the day, what we're trying to do here is very simple. We're trying to provide a good cup of tea so people can feel good, improve their health. Just trying to like not take ourselves too seriously, have fun, and remember that it's just tea.

Alana Muller  13:15
Love that so much. Before we close out, I want to ask you just a fun question that I love to ask my guests. And the answers are always so fabulous and varied. If you could meet with one person, say over a cup of tea, who would it be and why? And it could be anyone, living, not living, fictional, nonfictional — your choice.

Lisa Govro  13:34
If I could meet with anyone for a cup of tea, I would probably meet with my original yoga teacher Shraddha who passed away last year from cancer. And, she was just such a huge influence in my life. I studied with her for over 10 years, on and off, and she just always had the right answer for everything and could kind of like just get inside my brain and sort of knew what I was thinking, so.

Alana Muller  14:02
That's really beautiful. That's really beautiful. Well, you've inspired me to go have a cup of Big Heart Tea. So before I do that, what I'd love for you to share with us as Lisa Govro of Big Heart Tea Co., tell our listeners where they can go to learn more about you and about Big Heart Tea Company.

Lisa Govro  14:18
Absolutely well, bighearttea.com is the best place to learn about me, the company, and also you know, put a few teas in your cart and try some at home.

Alana Muller  14:29
Beautiful. So great to have you on Enterprise.ing podcast. Thank you so much for being here.

Lisa Govro  14:34
Yeah, thank you for having me.

Alana Muller  14:37
Thanks for joining us this week on Enterprise.ing. Be sure to visit our website, enterprisebank.com/podcast to subscribe so you'll never miss an episode. If you found value in today's program, please consider leaving a review on Apple Podcasts or telling a friend about us. Enterprise.ing, powering business leaders one conversation at a time.

Alana Muller  15:02
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