Meet Kara Armstrong of The Conscious Merchant and Consciously Cleaner in The Highlands

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

Kara, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
I have a Masters in Public Health with focus on Health Promotion. I was in clinical research for 15 years, in everything from pediatric trauma, reproductive health and most recently in oncology working with FDA oversight and safety of clinical trials. I was good at my job but it was a job and not what excited me.

After the birth of my second child, I became extremely ill and spent a lot of time in doctors offices trying to find answers. It was during that process that I became acutely aware of how environmental exposures are affecting our health, from what we put in our bodies to what we put on our bodies and what we surround ourselves with daily. I started working with a company called Beautycounter and from there started helping clients and myself look further than our personal care products to our whole home and offices. I discovered the challenges in the overwhelming amount of information on the Internet and the vast number of products that were hard to sift through. The end of 2018, I started Consciously Cleaner, a consulting business to help individuals, families, and offices assess their environmental exposures and create realistic plans for sustainability and healthier environments, with reduced harmful chemical exposure.

My true passion is in retail, so January 2019, we joined forces with Nurture, Denver and are creating an experiential boutique sustainable and clean living store. Our core mission is to create joy in clean and sustainable living by taking out the work for our customer by curating whole home collections of vetted and researched companies to make shopping convenient with confidence. We believe strongly in education, empowerment, and community and will make these pillars of the store through workshops, sustainability initiatives, and community connection.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It definitely wasn’t easy, my personal journey and that with my clients started as a struggle because there is a vast amount of information out there to navigate. Environmental exposures and our health are a challenging arena with lots of data in some areas and not so much in others.

To top it off, leaving the corporate world is scary, entering the unknown of clients true needs, products desired in a retail setting, operational pieces I haven’t looked at in years, it all has it’s challenges.

I feel confident in where and how we’re looking at data with a strong community behind us to find answers to help with clients wellness or sustainable interests. Now we just keep learning and evolving to meet the needs of the community! There’s no room to being stagnant.

The Conscious Merchant and Consciously Cleaner – what should we know? What do you do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
Often times individuals are interested in making sustainable or cleaner changes in their home but can’t figure out how that realistically plays out. We pride ourselves on helping customers with a vision of what that looks like for them by incorporating our consulting knowledge with an experiential place to touch and see how products play into their lives.

The Conscious Merchant’s core mission is to create joy in clean and sustainable living by taking out the work for our customer. There are lots of brand on the market and often sustainable and safer don’t intersect, we are taking the two concepts and looking at both simultaneously for our clients so they can shop with confidence. We ask the questions of our vendors so customers don’t have to and can shop with confidence! We also pride ourselves on being a place of empowerment and education. Come in to ask a question, see what sustainable might look like for you and enjoy connecting with community over a cup of tea or sample of Kombucha- we’re here to connect!

We live in an all or nothing society and we pride ourselves in our consulting business, Conscious Cleaner consulting, to help people really look at their lives and what is realistic for them to change without going down the rabbit hole of all the many “safer” and “sustainable” things we “should be doing.” An example I often call on is the recent media on dental floss being dangerous for your health. Yes, there are brands using a toxic chemical and yes we should demand for change, but no you shouldn’t stop flossing and that may not be your highest risk factor- let’s look at your risk, what you use and how we can find a solution.

We believe very strongly in Progress not Perfection and strive to get there with our customers. We aim to not have cookie cutter solutions, but an array of actionable changes that meet your specific wants, needs and concerns.

Kara also provides workshops and group setting experiences for helping individuals look at their homes or offices and create healthier and sustainable places. Check out Found(h)er for an upcoming workshop.

We’ll be popping up at Free Market mid-Sept and please stay tuned at our event pages on our websites.

What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
Saying, “yes” to Nurture. Retail is changing and there are many people that suggest small retailers are being phased out. I’m so proud to be creating a space that isn’t just another box store but a place with bring the community together and keep small retail accessible.

Contact Info:

• Address: 2949 Federal Blvd.
  Denver, CO 80211
• Website: www.consciouslycleaner.com; www.theconsciousmerchant.com
• Email: kara@consciouslycleaner.com
• Instagram: @karaarmstrongmph @theconsciousmerchant
• Facebook: www.consciouslycleaner.com

Image Credit:
JustBPhotography and Amber Story

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