By Deborah Bier and Donna Cunningham, Vibration Magazine Editors
 On February 1, 2002, the Flower Essence Pharmacy of West Linn, Oregon, announced they will be soon closing their doors. In its various incarnations over the years, FEP has been serving essence-loving folks in the United States as one-stop stopping for many, many essence makers' work. They carried the largest number of essence lines in the world, allowing consumers to explore many unusual remedies from smaller companies, as well as making it easier for those of us in the US to obtain products from abroad. In the past year, they also launched a print magazine about essences; this, too, will be discontinued.
We are very sad to see FEP go; the essence field will be now the weaker for this loss. They provided an unparalleled diversity of product lines which benefited the essence-using world by their depth and breadth. It will henceforth be more difficult to obtain foreign-made essences. It will be more complicated to buy the fine work of many companies -- or for consumers to even know they exist as options. For many years, they also sponsored weekend workshops so that essence makers from around the world could give students and practitioners an in-depth exposure to their essences. The essence world may thus become a smaller place.
FEP also provided a stabilizing factor among other essence distributors in the United States by acting as a strong competitor. The dynamic of this market force kept the field from being overly dominated by any single distributor, creating pressure for fairness toward both customers and small essence companies alike.
How Can the World Wide Essence Society Help?
The WWES was founded to promote essences of all kinds and to join and educate  consumers, practitioners and makers all over the world. In the face of the loss of FEP, we pledge to continue our mission. We have always believed as a field that we are much stronger working together than apart and we dedicate ourselves to nurturing that unity. We will continue to offer:
Education reflecting the broadest view on vibrational essences, limited to no particular brand or company.
Our listings of essence makers, practitioners, and educators, reaching well over a hundred visitors. They are either free, or have a nominal fee.
Magazine sponsorships (like the one at top of this page) on some articles pointing readers to the WWES' Resource Listings.
A link to our Resources Listings on the magazine masthead on every page (above).
Magazine page sponsorships allow essence companies, practitioners and educators to advertise their services and products at extremely low prices. They can act as a gateway to a Website, as a short classified ad, or...well, use your imagination!
Quarterly Ezine, contributed to by makers, practitioners and consumers, they offer a wide variety of experiences for our learning. (see our Writer's Guidelines if you wish to contribute an article.)
We are starting to offer essence training, as you will see later in this issue of Vibration.
Over 200 Vibration Magazine articles -- and counting -- online and free in our back issues (see our back article index to get an idea of our wide array of articles).
Free subscriptions to Vibration Magazine (send email to vibration-subscribe@yahoogroups.com). We would love to reach more people with this educational resource, so if you have friends, students, or clients who are interested in learning about essences, please pass it along to them.
Easy-to-find information. You can search for an specific topic or essence on our site-wide search engine. We have also assembled articles on particular topics into  into Virtual Booklets, like the upcoming one on Essences and Bodywork. For access to all our booklets, visit our Back Issues Index.
Our Essence Message Forum (click on button at right) is used by some of the nicest consumers, practitioners, and essence makers around to discuss all kinds of essence-related topics -- join them!
Is there something else you think we can offer to help bring vibrational essences to the widest variety of people? Email us with your thoughts and ideas.
While we cannot make up for the loss of such a large essence distributor as FEP, we can continue to do our part to connect people who need and love essences.
ART CREDITS: The candy heart tile is from Absolute Background Textures Archive
The animated heart tile is from Susan's Free Animations. Flowers from ArtToday.
The inner two layers and page design created by Word of Mouth Web Design.
The World Wide Essence Society does not mean to imply any recommendation of nor give certification to any individuals or companies above. This article is provided purely for informational purposes. We ask consumers to make their own determination as to quality of the services and products offered above. This article is not meant to be advice, and the information is not meant to replace medical or psychological treatment.
  
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