Meet Jessica Armstrong of Peyton’s Potion in Glenwood Springs

Today we’d like to introduce you to Jessica Armstrong.

Thanks for sharing your story with us Jessica. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
Whenever I am asked this question, my mind goes straight to seeing my son, Peyton, when he is ten years old and bald and has a green tint to his skin and he’s seat on a barstool at the kitchen counter. He’s recovering from a spinal tap and chemo infusion but left where he was resting on the couch to focus on pouring drops of our special formula for a cleaning solution into glass bottles that line the counter. He’s singing as he does this. We’ll give these bottles to friends, families and strangers who learned about Peyton and Peyton’s Potion and they’ll donate to our fundraising efforts for childhood cancer research. Peyton will write a check to CureSearch, an organization that funds all childhood cancer research. He’ll smile as he writes it. Then we’ll pack up and drive 3 hours to Denver again for another long infusion day or days. We’ll do this routine just about every week for 3 and 1/2 years.

We’ll raise over $5,000.00 during his cancer treatment, which may not seem like much for that length of time, but it was accomplished during a time in his childhood when he could barely do much of anything at all. Because of his fundraising efforts for childhood cancer research, he would accept the invitation to walk alongside leading researchers in the field of childhood cancer, touring their research labs. And when his cancer treatment was all over, he and I would receive a Humanitarian Award from our county called “Inseparable Courage” for our donations through Peyton’s Potion. It was during the acceptance for that award that Peyton, at the age of 13, would express how he would dedicate his life to helping serve anyway he could to childhood cancer research.

The story and mission of Peyton’s Potion began with the question I asked myself shortly after my child became a cancer patient — How can we make sense of this? In October 2010, Peyton was life-flighted through a severe snowstorm over the Rocky Mountains to Denver and hours later, given a cancer diagnosis of acute lymphocytic leukemia. Further testing showed that he had a type of leukemia called Mixed Lineage Leukemia, a fatal cancer that occurs primarily in infants, not in a child his age. Being told your child has cancer is the most unwelcome news and then add to that a great deal of uncertainty by the medical staff of what to do for him; it all made me constantly have thoughts of “How can we make sense of this?” When I learned about the enormous toxic burden the chemotherapies would have on Peyton’s body and that that toxic burden would be for 3 1/2 years, I immediately had the thought that I must minimize toxins wherever I could in his environment to not add to that burden and to support him in his healing.

As I looked for ways to do that, I read on a pediatric website that the greatest amount of toxins that children are exposed to on a daily basis are the ingredients found in common household cleaners. I was shocked to learn that there is no federal regulation in the U.S. for household cleaning products and that ingredients nor products need to meet any sort of safety standard. There’s about 60 or so dangerous chemicals we are exposed to daily in our homes and the cumulative effect these types of chemicals have on our bodies is nothing to ignore. I decided that one way we could make sense of things was to change what we cleaned with, so I threw out hundreds of dollars worth of cleaning supplies in our home and started to educate myself on safe and effective ways to clean beyond the usual alternative – vinegar. I ordered high-quality essential oils that had anti-microbial and anti-bacterial properties. With Peyton at the kitchen counter, we did our own “science project”, mixing essential oils using a guide book, until we created an aroma that he loved.  That formula became our one and only household cleaner.  We would ask people to use it on their hands when they came to visit him, gave bottles of it to friends and family to show our gratitude for their help and support and what happened was unexpected — everyone came back wanting more.

It was around this time that I had an unusual and fortuitous experience. Rarely did I leave Peyton, even if family or friends were able to stay with him, but there was one time my emotions were so overwhelming that I needed to get away and just drive around, I felt an impulse to stop at a local used bookstore and when I walked in the first book I took off the shelf was “Love, Medicine and Miracles” by Bernie S. Siegel, M.D.  After reading the front and back cover, I opened to a random page in the middle and read one sentence that set the whole course forward for Peyton’s Potion. The sentence was about how patients who advocate for their prognosis have better chances surviving their disease. I bought the book and came home and talked to Peyton about coming up with a name for our cleaner and selling it so we could donate the money to childhood cancer research and he would write all the donation checks. I’ll never forget the smile on his face when he heard that idea.

Has it been a smooth road?
I think every endeavor that is meaningful to us will have twists and turns and it’s important to be prepared for those times by first letting go of the natural expectation that just because you think you have a great idea or your endeavor is heartfelt or born of a challenge, that it is going to be smooth sailing. Even though I had very little time and energy to devote to other things during Peyton’s treatment, when I could, I took a few evening and weekend business classes at our local college. The first obstacle I had with Peyton’s Potion was the fear that these classes caused me to have. I really questioned many times if I could or should attempt to push on with Peyton’s Potion after Peyton’s cancer treatment was over. Before Peyton was diagnosed, I was a stay-at-home mom, taking care of him and our two older children. I didn’t know anything about how to run a business with a product. As I continued to learn more through these classes and through talking with friends who were successful business owners, my fear slowly quelled and I began to develop confidence through the mindset of — just keep learning.

Once Peyton was out of cancer treatment and we stepped into making Peyton’s Potion a business, we brought on partners, Joshua Margolis and Meghan Brosnan and a marketing consultant from Denver, Elizabeth Boulus. At times the tasks before us seemed incredibly daunting, but you can overcome obstacles better with good and honest people by your side, who want the same thing you do. Everything from packaging, labeling, negotiating with vendors, finding venues were all new to me, to Peyton and to our partners. We were all learning together.

One of the major challenges we face in our company now is that there are many products competing in a similar niche to ours, that being “safer and sustainable”, however when you examine their ingredients and practices most of them fall short of their claims. One study done by an environmental consulting firm revealed that more than 95 percent of so-called green consumer products had committed at least one “greenwashing sin.” When I learned how ubiquitous this type of marketing is– to spend more money and time on marketing their product as environmentally friendly rather than on actually minimizing their environmental impact– I wanted to really make sure Peyton’s Potion was not like that in anyway. For instance, because pesticides are known to cause cancer, the making of our cleaning solution does not involve any practices that use pesticides or known cancer-causing agents. We only use essential oils from plants that are organic, therefore not exposing the workers who grow the plants to pesticides. Peyton’s Potion is truly a “clean” product in all aspects and we take a lot of pride in knowing that that includes the consideration of the planet, communities and individuals…

And of course, I need to mention one of the biggest challenges for us and that is that we want people to smell Peyton’s Potion and that’s difficult to do with online selling. Every time someone smells it, they love it and want some for themselves and for their friends and family. We are always interested in vendors who want to sell our product. We have a culinary school in Nantucket that sells Peyton’s Potion in their culinary store. We have a few more places it is sold locally in our home town, namely our local hospital.

We’d love to hear more about your business.
When we became partners with Joshua and Meghan in 2018, we worked with Pranarom USA to take the formula Peyton and I created and make it work even better, while still capturing the same aroma profile. Let me give you the list of scientifically formulated organic essential oils in Peyton’s Potion –French lavender, Tea Tree, Clove Bud, Sweet Orange, Lime, Citronella, Fir Silver, Eucalyptus, Rosemary, Coriander Seed, Frankincense, Rose Geranium and Cinnamon Bark! There is so much cleaning power in the natural defense mechanisms in each of these botanicals. I love that, but I also love how you get a mini-aromatherapeutic treatment each time you clean with Peyton’s Potion. You, your child, your pet all get a mood boost while you clean as opposed to getting a headache or coughing or having skin irritation that other cleaners cause.

Also, you get a mood boost in another way when you use Peyton’s Potion — customers have told us that it feels good knowing they are helping children with cancer, too. Our tagline is “Cleaning up for childhood cancer.”  In addition, we spent a year working on a custom soap blend, that again uses only the most thoughtfully considered ingredients, yet are as effective as they are safe. So, I think with all that, we can claim that we have a truly unique cleaner, unlike any other. I’m proud of the fact that Peyton’s Potion is a product that is truly about health and happiness in all facets of its curation, impact and uses.

We are also proud to be part of the childhood cancer research community nationally. This past September, for childhood cancer awareness month, we were national sponsors for CureSearch for their United Walk. We donate 5% of all our proceeds to CureSearch but in the month of September, we donate an additional 25%… There are just a small handful of businesses and products in the world that give to childhood cancer research and we are the only cleaning product that does.

Is our city a good place to do what you do?
We would love to work with vendors in the Denver area! Our goal is to have Peyton’s Potion be a household name and it would be wonderful for that to begin with the state of Colorado, especially in Denver where Peyton received his cancer treatment. We are open to anyone interested in working with us. As we expand, we will definitely need a manufacturer and have considered Denver to be where that will happen.

A few Denver businesses have taken part of our paper crane project for children with childhood cancer. That project started when Peyton was gifted 1,000 paper cranes during his cancer treatment by a woman we never met from Japan. It’s the story behind our logo and branding. You can learn more about that and our ongoing paper crane project for children in current cancer treatment on our website.

Pricing:

• Starter Set – 8 0z + Refill Concentrate $14.95. (5% goes to CureSearch)
• Refill Concentrate – $8.95. or 4 Pack for $33.95 (5% goes to CureSearch)
• 1 0z Spritzer – $5.95 (5% goes to CureSearch)
• Subscription gives you 10% off every time

Contact Info:

• Website: peytonspotion.com
• Phone: 970-987-5162
• Email: jess@peytonspotion.com
• Instagram: peytonspotion
• Facebook: peytonspotion

Image Credit:
Meghan Brosnan

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