This week we celebrate International Women's Day
My story began before gender equality was considered a social issue. The women in my story were ahead of their time. They moved forward because they had to... and I feel blessed in so many ways. This is how and why OrganiQ evolved. I hope in some way to inspire and allow women to take time to honour and love themselves.
I am Sally Paech Founder and Director of OrganiQ. This brand was always a mother daughter enterprise, before the products ... before the journey
I grew up on Ki, surrounded by nature, the ocean and abundant fresh produce.
My father died when I was three and my mum’s father three months later
That left 3 girls, two farms ...
My mother managed the farms, cared for my grandmother and kept us going on a wage of cleaning shacks.
Life goes on. It has to. And she worked so hard to make sure I never missed out.
I didn't mention ... I was adopted (from birth)
I completed my education in Adelaide and my soul ached for the Island. I know now that I was experiencing deep seeded PTSD and BPD. I was numb and lost and the only way I could articulate this was through my body. By the end of year 12 I was a sick girl. My mother put everything in to keeping me alive.
If having an alcoholic husband, losing both parents and mentors wasn't enough. She spent ten years battling to keep me alive.
I don't know how I'm here. Medicine can't explain it either.
There are so many blank spaces from the age of 18 - 29
My community - the island - inherent grit and the will of mum to look outside the square, For treatment ... for answers (something she inherited from her mother)
I went back to the island one winter. I was so ill but needed to get in to the ocean. At 36kg I could have blown away. Mum drove me to the beach. Heaters blaring but the ocean has a magnetic power. It moves with the moon. It is undeniable that magic happens.
I've always been conscious about what I put on and in my body. But the skincare products that I was using weren't living up to their claims.
(Marketing bullshit and brand names. )
I started mixing ingredients in our kitchen overlooking the ocean.
Pure ingredients proven to be beneficial to the skin..
Ingredients so pure that you could eat them.
After all, If you wouldn't eat it, why would you put it on your body?
Your skin is your largest organ. It actually breathes!
The products and the creation gave me a purpose, something of value that I could give to others. And friends and family were loving it ... and buying it.
I'm a 6th generation islander
My grandmother started on of the first free range egg enterprises just as Eucalyptus oil was being produced and honey collected
So it seemed a natural progression to include these ancient ingredients within my products. Every single product has its own special story related to the island
Every online order is sent with home grown rose petals as an ode to my childhood on my grandmothers farm. Collecting eggs and picking roses; some of which were over 100 years old. Memories that are still so clear today.
The Island is part of my brand and soul on so many levels.
About three years ago I returned to the Island, after a Yoga teacher training in Bali. I was at one of my most fragile periods and not many people thought I would survive.
The Island is like a wave, there is an undeniable energy that washes over you. Chance encounters that seem to happen without effort, at just the right time.
This was when my life changed.
When I chose life, when someone saw in to me, helped me to see in to myself.
My beauty, my intelligence, my value.
We are undeniably a product of our experience, our environment. I am blessed with the incredible people who surround me in my personal life and business, and for my Island home.
So as you see, that jar is so much more than a beauty product.
It is a story, a journey, a lineage.
and in time… I hope… a legacy.