Healing the healer

Out of a devastating business breakdown, a new local brand has emerged, writes Lara Picone

Anthia Koullouros doesn’t want to hear that business isn’t personal. For the long-time Paddington naturopath and organic tea crafter, business is, in fact, acutely personal.

“I create teas, tisanes and herbal remedies and provide services, which are personal. I'm in the business of helping people heal,” she says.

Many locals have sought Koullouros’s naturopathic advice on their personal path to health, which she dispenses with genuine empathy from her Glenmore Rd clinic. And many more have purchased her carefully considered teas under the label she started and nurtured more than 16 years, Ovvio Organic Teas.

Yet, oftentimes, the healer finds they are the one in need of a remedy.

As a practising naturopath with 26 years of clinical experience and as the founder of a popular tea brand, no one could accuse Koullouros of not being a savvy operator. However, as for many others, 2020 proved the year that took her to the edge professionally and, therefore, personally.

But unlike many, Koullouros’s struggle wasn’t entirely COVID-induced. Rather, a business partnership that didn’t align as she had hoped saw her walk away from Ovvio Organic Teas, divorcing herself from the brand and starting out again under her own name.

The crisis came when Koullouros moved to scale up the small business to take the brand to a bigger audience. But things did not turn out as she imagined when entering the partnership.

“I needed capital and I needed operating support,” she says.

As Koullouros explained to her customers in a heartfelt email last year: “[I had] the intention of expanding the operational component of the brand. I packed down my warehouse and moved its contents to their Queensland warehouse. Whilst it seemed like a good fit at the time, for a number of reasons the relationship did not work out.

“I soon realised there was no chance for a resolution. After 16 years of creating and nurturing my beloved Ovvio, I decided to walk away. I couldn’t keep fighting for something I already have — the heart and soul of my brand.”

For Koullouros, the split left her shell-shocked and, indeed, grief-stricken.

“I am still in the grief of it all,” she says. “It’s heartbreaking that such a thing can happen. But when you're tired and [the business] requires different expertise, and if you're a personality type, like me, that already doubts her ability as a woman in business, and someone comes along and says, ‘We can take all of this off your hands’, it's very enticing.”

The counsellor in Koullouros has begun a deep analysis of the breakdown, using the knowledge she has built in her practice to assess the impact the split had on her. She has come to believe that she has suffered the sort of setback that particularly affects women founders, who might not have as much hubris and self-confidence as men.

“Being a woman in business is hard,” she says. “Particularly with men in a position of power. We saw it play out on a worldwide stage with American politics.”

And as a person who had diligently and lovingly tended her brand for 16 years — absorbing the business into her own identity in the process — the fallout felt particularly intimate.

“It’s incredible how we gaslight ourselves as women,” she says, adding that women are programmed to question themselves.

“If you have the intuition [that something is amiss], you think, ‘Is it intuition or is it me just being silly because I'm emotional?’ This might not have happened to everyone, but I imagine it could happen to many women. I think women get into this position quite a lot out of fear of litigation.”

The experience strengthened Koullouros’s resolve to back herself and brought about a greater understanding of the importance of aligning with like-minded people, ethically, morally and on a business level.

“I was aware of it as it was all unpacking. I thought, ‘Oh, my goodness, this is what we think as women. I've heard this so many times before. I'm now saying all those things and have been for so long. None of that is true.’ It wasn't until I was in it that I thought, ‘No, I actually do know what I'm doing’,” she says.

For all of the pain of the past 12 months, Koullouros isn’t one to dwell or be defeated. Instead, her experience, though unpleasant, has become a catalyst to start anew. “It’s a tomb before a womb,” she says. “Sometimes things need to die away for a more original rebirth.”

That rebirth can be sipped and savoured in the form of Koullouros’s new tea brand, Apotheca By Anthia. Sold online and at her clinic, the range of teas and tisanes includes small-batch and limited-edition everyday drinking, and, arriving this month, a collection of naturopathic and botanic remedy teas.

As with everything Koullouros creates, Apotheca by Anthia is crafted using high-quality ingredients and formed with an intent to nurture and heal, not just our bodies, but also the planet.

Sometimes the winds of change come in an unfriendly guise, but once we pick through the wreckage the results are arguably better for the personal lessons they illuminate.

Koullouros admits she would never have willingly let go of Ovvio, but was looking to refine the brand to what Apotheca By Anthia has become.

“I just evolved Ovvio into Apotheca,” she says. “I took out as much as I could, extracted every single essence because, for me, business is personal.”

While Koullouros is still tinkering with her eponymous, born-again collection, which is inspired by her Greek Cypriot heritage and her knowledge of herbal medicine, her loyal tea followers couldn’t care less about what logo is on the packaging. They simply come for Anthia’s tea.

“It's terrible what happened. It’s hard for me to see the [former] brand out there,” she says.

“But that experience won’t happen for me again. The thing I do know is how to start a brand. I know my industry. And I just know I want to create really good, considered, healthy teas, tisanes and remedies — and services — which is what I've always been doing.”

Apotheca By Anthia

1A Glenmore Rd

apothecabyanthia.com