Style: October 02, 2020

24 Style | Feature
Was it a whim or intuition? Jytte Glintborg ponders
out loud and surmises she possibly still doesn’t
know. Eight years ago, when the existing owners of
Christchurch’s Zurma Botanical Oil Studio, an essential oil
and natural health business, said it was for sale, within a
split second Jytte had offered to buy it.
Perhaps it was an unconscious decision, she decides,
as she has always had a deep connection to nature and
its healing benefits. And after 40 years as a massage
therapist, there
was a practical drawcard that it could be something for
her to do next.
But life, as it sometimes tends to do, delivered Jytte
and her husband Tremane Barr, a curveball. Tremane
was diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer that had
spread to his liver.
“He was given about six months. We declined
treatment because they couldn’t offer much anyway. But
it set us on a course that we were very dedicated to
finding everything natural that could help and essential
oils were part of that, as well as a large range of other
things,” she says.
And now, hearing Tremane pottering away in the
background, it means this story has a happy ending.
Seven years after the diagnosis at Christchurch Hospital,
he is still alive and well.
“But it was the catalyst, and we became very serious
about optimal health and wellbeing because we know
how important it is,” she says.
Their journey to find the “absolute best quality oils”
led them via the internet all around the globe, developing
a network of professionals who guided them to the best
sources.
“For every oil we get a report which specifies each
component in the oil so we can see the quality. Some
companies won’t supply this, so we buy from suppliers
who have that documentation so we know what we
stock is very potent. We don’t go for price, we go for
quality,” she says.
Simply because, she says, their family knows how
important health is, and people need to have trust that a
product will help support it.
“We have a few key people we work with; very small
companies that specialise. Some of them are a little bit
of a closed group and to get in took recommendations
from other people. This is because they are exceptionally
dedicated to quality,” she says.
The rise of essential oil in recent years has led to
harmful improper use, says Jytte, and though essential oils
are natural, they are a hundred times more concentrated
than their plant counterparts and must be used properly.
Working with Jytte and Tremane is their daughter Kiri
Barr-Glintborg, Matt Wilham and two aromatherapists,
Belinda Nicholls and Gillian Parkinson. The team has
been kept busy as people seek support for anxiety and
health boosters with the onset of Covid-19. The team
develop
their own blends, which can take weeks to test.
Jytte’s passion for essential oils is evident throughout
the conversation. She speaks knowledgeably about them,
in a way that only people with a true connection to their
work do. She describes recently opening a new box of
oils like an excited child would when opening a present.
Even though it made no sense at the time, trusting her
intuition all those years ago has led Jytte and her family
very much in the right direction.
ABOVE: Zurma Botanical Oil Studio is family owned and operated.
From left: Tremane Barr, Kiri Barr-Glintborg and Jytte Glintborg.