The American Spirit: Icons and Entrepreneurs, The Doctor and Elina
(NEWS 3) KALAMAZOO - Through the years, dozens of internationally renowned corporations have called West Michigan home. One of the biggest and best known was the Upjohn Company. Ultimately, of course, this pharmaceutical pioneer merged with Pharmacia of Sweden and then was acquired by the even-larger Pfizer corporation.
However, for most folks around these parts, the name Upjohn remains an icon, not only because of its founder's legendary business achievements but also for his philosophy of caring and service to others.
Interesting to speculate that the good doctor's spiritual descendant in the pursuit of the American Dream might well be a Russian transplant, now part of the Kalamazoo business community.
Throughout his long career, Dr. William Erastus Upjohn wore three titles, simultaneously: he was a man of medicine, a man of commerce, and a man of service.
W.E. - Rastus to his close friends - belonged to a family of doctors: his father, uncle and two of his three brothers were all physicians. But W.E. was something more. Those close to him remember he was, first and foremost, an inveterate dreamer and inventor.
Early mass produced pills were hard; so hard that the Upjohn Company would later claim they often passed through the body undigested. In the early 1880s, Dr. Upjohn experimented on a more effective pill, a 'friable' one that would dissolve easily in the bloodstream. By 1885, that tinkering paid off and W.E. his three brothers formed the Upjohn Pill and Granule Company.
Although the Upjohn Company enjoyed steady growth, by the turn of the century, the friable pill was becoming outdated; the coming thing was the compressed tablet. Upjohn was adding them to its product line gradually, but to buy itself some time, the company began marketing health care remedies such as cough syrup, cold remedies, and a skin lotion known as Cream of Crushed Roses - Beauty's Tonic.
Here, Dr. Upjohn's path begins to converge with that of Elina Fedotova - a certified cosmetic chemist and herbologist trained in Moscow.
Elina believes that beauty does not come from a tube of lipstick or a jar of cold cream. She believes true beauty lies within, and is evident by the appearance of a person's skin.
"Skin usually shows how healthy a person is,” Elina explains. “Usually, lots of things in an unhealthy body, you can read through the skin. And that's my approach, to bring not only beauty to the person but most importantly, health.”
Since 1998, Elina has operated her own skin care clinic and spa in Kalamazoo. After working for others for many years, she began refining her own ideas of holistic health combined with customer service. Elina also began producing her own line of hand-made, herbal skin products that are completely natural, even edible.
These small batches of hand-made, all-natural skin care products are as different from mass produced cosmetics as frozen pizzas are from your mother's home-cooked Sunday dinners. Elina's products are now distributed worldwide and six months ago, she opened a second clinic in Chicago. Last year, Elina was even spotlighted on a reality TV show.
But running a business is not without cost. Elina says, "To start your own business means, literally, you're working all the time. There is no time when you're not sleeping that you're not working, because I'm thinking about my business all the time. I would say, start your own business only if you cannot wait to start it. If it's your passion - your love - that's the only way, the only reason to start your own business.”
Although her business empire is growing, Elina still works personally with clients several days a week. Partly, this is for scientific reasons: working with skin regularly helps her to develop new products. It is also personal, because although she gives a lot to her clients, she says she gets back even more.
