8/25/2015 Matters of Principle

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Matters of PrincipleHow Heather Isely and Natural Grocers Hold Fast to their ValuesMonday, August 10, 2015

Heather IselyExecutive Vice President and CorporateSecretary, Natural Grocers

With nothing more than 200 borrowed dollars and a dream to make healthy livingaffordable, husband and wife duo, Margaret and Philip Isely, started what would becomethe Natural Grocers empire of natural and organic groceries and supplements.

Their dream was born in 1955 after Margaret became chronically ill and received little helpfrom Western medicine. She decided to heal herself through nutrition and utilized theprinciples of some of the top natural health gurus at the time. What Margaret and her

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Margaret and Baby Robin Isely in frontof original Lakewood store

husband learned ignited a passion in them to help others do the same, and their vision ofmaintaining one’s health through nutrition prospered.

Today, their children continue this legacy. Building on what their parents started from theground up, expanding and improving, they continue to stay true to their parent’s originaldream and the five founding principles: offering nutrition education, selling only thehighest quality products, maintaining affordable prices, and a commitment to communityand their employees.

All in the FamilyThose values have since taken the company from a humble couple offering door­to­doornutritional education to an influential advocate for food standards, with more than $500million in sales last year from 100 retail stores in 17 states, and more than 2,200employees. Perhaps best of all, while the company is publicly traded, it’s managed toremain family­run – by siblings Kemper Isely, Zephyr Isely and Heather Isely, along withformer sister­in­law Elizabeth Isely at the helm.

Heather Isely has made it her business to knowevery aspect of the family enterprise, where she’sworked since she was a kid. Back then, she ran theregister, stocked the shelves, and cleaned the floors.She did whatever was needed. Today, Isely serves asExecutive Vice President and Corporate Secretaryand has a seat on the company’s board of directors.Since officially joining the company as an employeein 1989, she’s held roles ranging from StoreManager to Manager of Operations to Director ofHuman Resources.

“No matter what career you want to do, it’s reallyimportant to look at where there are gaps, what needs to be covered and what you can do tocover them,” says Isely. “The way we were raised is that you should know how to doeverything in the business. If you are a store manager, you need to know how to run everysingle department in your store. You don’t necessarily need to be an expert, but you need tounderstand how every department runs.”

8/25/2015 Matters of Principle

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Heather Isely

Building ConsensusIt’s not easy getting siblings to agree on anything – let alone run a half billion­dollarcompany — yet even after all the years and through rapid expansion, the executive team atNatural Grocers still manages to make decisions on a consensus basis.

“We work really well together and we all have our ownstrengths. We don’t tend to have a lot of disagreements aboutthe direction that the business is headed in,” Isely explains.“We come together, we make the decision and that’s how wemove forward. We’re all in alignment in most circumstancesbecause we all grew up in the business.”

For those who can’t reach a consensus so easily, Isely offerssome advice, “First, you have to work on alignment in termsof ‘we all believe in the same thing and want to pull in thesame direction, at the same time,’” says Isely. “There are a lotof different ideas on how best to run a business or make a

profit.”

Isely stresses the importance of having that conversation up front.

“What is it that we want to accomplish and how do we accomplish it?” says Isely. “If you’renot in alignment with those concepts, you will constantly be fighting.” Natural Grocersaims to hire employees who share in the same ideals and believe in their five foundingprinciples.

“If we don’t have that alignment, we’re not saying the same thing with the same voice,” saysIsely. “We ask our candidates ‘why do you want to work for our company? Having a passionfor it really helps find the right people to fill those positions.

Small Mistakes Can Lead to Big ConsequencesWhen reflecting on the biggest mistake she’s ever made in her career, Isely laughs, “It’sgoing to sound really silly, but leaving oranges that weren’t very sellable on the producecase. My brother and I got into a big argument over that. It was a poor choice on my part.Just because I didn’t have any oranges doesn’t mean I should have left a poor quality

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Original vitamin cottage

product on the rack that people would not have wanted to buy.”

It may sound inconsequential now, but Isely likes to remind herself of the story whenevershe thinks about the company’s strict adherence to quality. “It was hard when we firstbrought in our produce racks because we made a commitment early on to only sell organicproduce,” says Isely. “At that time there were periods of the year when you couldn’t getcertain staples that people wanted and I only had those ugly oranges. In a retail business,it’s really all about the customer experience and I wasn’t seeing that when I made thedecision to keep the oranges that would never sell.”

Perceptions of Women in BusinessAll these years later, Isely has never repeated hermistake. But she does continue to learn from thelife lessons that are handed to her as a woman inbusiness. Isely has the confidence to stand rightnext to her brothers and command exactly the samerespect, but there are still times when she’s metwith resistance from outsiders because of nothingmore than her gender.

“One of the biggest issues I still run into in thebusiness world is that as a woman, when you aredirect about your expectations and you may have tocall people to task because they didn’t meet thoseexpectations, you are considered bitchy,” Isely confesses. “It’s frustrating, but you deal withit by being persistent. I still think there is difficulty in being taken seriously or beinglistened to as a woman.”

Isely is fortunate in that she has strong support from her family and fellow executives, andcredits growing up with a strong, working mother who taught her where her true value lies.

“Unfortunately, women are still not taught to believe in themselves deeplyand on a level outside of appearance,” says Isely. “It’s so important to valueall of yourself and all of your skills while not bringing your physicalappearance in as an aspect of that value. Women bring an importantperspective into the workplace. Men also bring an important perspective into

8/25/2015 Matters of Principle

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the workplace. We should all value each other for our unique talents.”

Invest in Your HealthSelling Natural Grocers as an attractive investment is something Isely does on a regularbasis, but her best investment tip is to invest in one’s own health.

“There’s nothing more important than investing in your health. As a working mom and aworking woman, if you don’t take the time to take care of your health then you won’t beable to take care of your family or your business,” explains Isely.

Natural Grocers was built on investing in one’s health, and Isley knows it is the key tokeeping yourself able to do the things you need to do. That starts with eating right, gettingthe movement you need, and getting enough sleep.

“Sometimes it feels like you can’t fit it all in a 24­hour period, but without your health,you’ll have nothing,” Says Isely.

Having it all may be elusive, but in both health and business, Heather Isely comes prettyclose.

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