Advice Line with Susan Griffin-Black of EO Products

Susan Griffin-Black built EO Products from a 10-gallon pot in a garage into a major natural personal care brand, and she never took outside investment to do it. On the Advice Line, she fielded calls from three early-stage founders and offered direct, experience-based counsel on distribution strategy, brand positioning, and how to scale from a local base. The conversation was less about EO’s history than about the operating principles that carried it through crises—and how those principles apply to founders facing different versions of the same hard choices.

Distribution as a trust funnel, not a binary choice

The first caller, Dr. Ruchie Gupta, runs Yobi, a probiotic skin and hair care line she developed after her daughter’s severe eczema. Her business does about $33,000 in sales, with 40% repeat purchase rates, and she was torn between doubling down on DTC or pushing into professional channels like dermatologist offices and medi-spas. Griffin-Black rejected the either-or framing. She argued that professional distribution feeds DTC because it builds trust and discoverability. The product’s core asset is not the channel—it is the story of a pediatrician who created a solution for her own child. Griffin-Black recommended starting locally in Chicago, building relationships with salons, spas, and doctors’ offices within a 150-mile radius, and letting that ripple outward. She a