Chicago Couple has Much to be Thankful for this Thanksgiving

Meet Hello to Natural Owners Darrell and Mary Johnson

By J. Coyden Palmer

When Darrell and Mary Johnson took the leap of faith and started yet another business five years ago, they were not sure what was going to happen. They had several ventures before opening their online store, Hello to Natural, which sells healthy skin products and fragrances. Some of the previous ventures failed, but the Chicago area couple stuck together through the difficult times and now Hello to Natural is thriving as they go into the holiday shopping season.

“We got together in 2008 and married in 2010,” said Mary, who has a background in corporate sales and marketing. “We launched four or five other businesses prior to Hello to Natural with varying amounts of success.”

When Darrell left a company and had two weeks off prior to taking another job, he came up with an idea after talking with a co-worker who was selling products on the side. Mary was not working at the time. Darrell wanted to see if in these two weeks he had off between jobs, if he and Mary could find something to buy in bulk and sell. At first, the Johnsons were looking at coconut oil or matcha tea. It was a visit to Mary’s sister’s house that coincided with a visit from Mary’s aunts from down south that gave the couple an idea.

Her aunts were big into using African soap and shea butter along with Mary. While at her sister’s house, a guy came by and set up shop with body oils, shea butter and other items and in less than an hour he made $500. Mary came home and told her husband they should look into it. Darrell agreed and began researching on how to make good shea butter. In one evening, they came up with the name of the business, an email, URL and filed for an LLC, all in less than an hour.

“I guess you can call us serial entrepreneurs,” Darrell said. We pick up a project, take it as far as it can go and then when the time comes start another project,” Darrell said.

“Fail fast,” Mary chimed in.

“Since we started Hello to Natural, we have a few other side projects that we’ve started. We always just learn from our previous endeavors because they are just lessons for the next one,” Darrell said.

The lessons learned by the Johnsons are now paying off. Hello to Natural is gaining its footing on a regional scale and more customers are coming to their site on a monthly basis to buy their products. With over 5,000 subscribers, Hello to Natural is doing something that is benefiting society as well as providing financial freedom.

“Prior to Hello to Natural, we started a pastry business where we were making monkey bread,” Mary said. “It was very successful and we were making good money and we probably could have taken that very far. But we reached a level where we were asking ourselves a conscious question: ‘Do we want to build an empire with this very decadent, very high in fat, sugar and salt product? Is this something that we want to build a business on?’ We decided to put it down because consciously, we knew when we created something, we wanted to bring value to the world. I’m not saying that people who make unhealthy foods are not adding value, but for us, we wanted to make sure we would have a clear conscious and even though monkey bread is delicious, we didn’t want to become monkey bread barons.” Mary said.

The challenges of starting a business can be hard enough, but try doing it while working a full-time job can make the endeavor even more challenging. That was the bump in the road the Johnsons kept encountering. At some point, they realized they would need to go all in if they were going to be successful.

“Both of us were working full-time jobs. And the reality in that is when you try to launch a business, it becomes a lot more challenging,” Mary said. “This particular business, Hello to Natural, we had a two-week sweet spot where neither or us were working and so we were genuinely able to focus and set a really strong foundation. I was really able to put the energy and focus into it that it needed when he left to start his new job when the two weeks were up,” Mary said. “I think it was the big difference between our other ventures and why this one has seen more success.”

After about 18 months, Hello to Fresh started producing and the couple had to make a tough decision. Darrell retired from his previous work as an IT in September of 2018 and Mary followed suit in February of 2019. They are both now fully invested in Hello to Natural.  

The Johnsons had no formal training on making the products they now sell. Darrell however does have a creative mind and also makes gospel music on the side. He began researching recipes on how to make the products. It was through a lot of trial and error and making adjustments along the way until the Johnsons found a recipe for their products they were comfortable with. The couple has always had a willingness to learn the basics of their industry to be successful in what they were doing.

“I remember the shea butter came out really grainy. We gave our first batch out to our aunts, mothers and other family members, who we used as guinea pigs,” Darrell said with a laugh. “They all told us it was good but too sandy. So, we looked up how to get rid of the sandiness in the shea butter by taking their feedback and then figuring it out. And that is what we’ve done consistently to refine our products to where we are today.”

They started out mainly selling just whipped shea butter and eight fragrances. They have since branched out to include African body soap and scented body oils. The Johnsons also make their own facial and body wash from the African black soap along with a shampoo. They have increased their body oil production to 70 different fragrances along with whipped shango, which is a combination of shea and mango butter. Hello to Natural now offers over 100 products.

The Johnsons used a crude, but effective grass-roots marketing strategy. They attended church conferences, vending events and at one point, Mary would just load up the car and have people come out and buy products right out the trunk of the vehicle.

“We were doing a gorilla marketing strategy,” Mary said. “We just jumped at every opportunity to get our products out there. We also told our friends and family that if you would take a picture with our products, we would give you some free stuff.”

“We gave a lot of free samples away and used a lot of word of mouth,” Darrell added. “It wasn’t a sophisticated strategy but it worked.”

The Johnsons recognize that many people fear their financial situation is preventing them from starting a business. They both say don’t let that genuine fear stop you, but also put yourself in the best position possible before you begin.

“We had paid both of our credit cards down quite a bit, so that gave us some cushion,” Darrell said. “We used that available credit for inventory.”

Mary said they figured out how to use their liquid cash more effectively. When her sister passed in 2018, they were also able to infuse some of the inheritance money into the business. Darrell also used some of his 401k savings. They want people to understand that they had to take some calculated financial risks to invest in the business.

“We learned after a while that it was unreasonable to think that we would not have debt,” Mary said. “We instead learned how to manage our debt effectively. We’ve put everything into this. Blood, sweat, tears, loans you name it. By managing our debt responsibility, we’ve always had access to lines of credit when we needed it.”

Their advice to new entrepreneurs is to go for it, but understand there are no shortcuts. You have to wake up every day with a purpose and determination, the Johnsons say. Darrell added that just being out of work and feeling the pressure of making the store work, is what helped the business more than anything else because it was all or nothing. He said he also watched a lot of tutorial videos on how to run the business, create ads and learn the market they were getting into. Having a strong spiritual faith doesn’t hurt either, the said.

“You have to have an imagination,” Darrell said. “You have to be able to visualize the success and outcome before it exists. You have to visualize your success, visualize the money you want to make, visualize that it is already there and all the work you are doing is what is going to release it to you.”

Darrell and Mary said an error many people make is being married to the original concept of the business. While Hello to Natural still offers their shea butter, line, they’ve now moved to offering other products that have made the business more successful.

“You have to be willing to pivot to what is making money,” Mary said.

“You can’t be too attached to something,” Darrell added. “Admit you are wrong going in one direction and maybe you should try going in another. Just doing that and opening yourself up to other considerations is something that can benefit you greatly.”

The Johnsons say having their own business has been very rewarding in ways other than financial reasons. Darrell said the ability to come up with your own products and ideas and put them in the marketplace is what he enjoys the most. He is currently working on a deodorant that he has been using for over a year. He is hoping to have that on the market soon.

Mary said the thing that is most rewarding for her lies in the pride of a married Black couple that has started their own successful business together. Even through all of the disappointments and trials, they have managed not just to survive, but now thrive.

“We managed to survive each other,” she said with a laugh. “I also lost my mother and sister as we were putting this thing together. Darrell lost a cousin he was really close to and most recently the passing of his father and our dog. We survived the financial challenges and stress that come with running a business and just the day-to-day functions of marriage. I feel very blessed that God has allowed us to start something, sustain us and now we have the ability to support ourselves and our dream, because both of us always wanted to work for ourselves.”

The couple does not have any children, so they say Hello to Natural is their baby. Most businesses don’t make it to their fifth year, something Hello to Natural will celebrate in January of 2022. The Johnsons feel very blessed right now and are excited about the future of the company.

For Black Friday and Cyber Monday weekend, Hello to Natural is offering discounts on some of their products for those who sign up for a FREE subscription to their website. With the subscription comes discounts of products and learning about upcoming offers and new products before the general public.

You can visit Hello to Natural at: www.hellotonatural.com