Expo West is the largest trade show in our industry. Attendance was strong—50,000, I heard—which is surprising, given the economic times we live in and all the belt-tightening going on. I think the high attendance reflects how much the organic sector is growing. One of my cameramen, Matt Cullen, strolled around the convention floor for an hour and barely saw 10 percent of the show.

I spent my time hanging out at the Perfect Weight America exhibit—we rented a nice piece of real estate—where I shook hands, had the usual stand-up meetings, and spoke a couple of times. Several visitors stand out. Art Jenson, the son of one of my health heroes, Dr. Bernard Jensen, along with his wife, Ellen, dropped by. I saw the Jensens on New Year’s Day at my first in-store event of the Perfect Weight America Tour ’08 earlier this year. That was in San Marcos north of San Diego. Art’s father was a pioneer in digestive cleansing, and his book, Tissue Cleansing Through Bowel Management, had a huge impact on me back in the late 1990s. I’ll never forget the pleasure I had meeting Dr. Jensen in 2001, when he was 92 years old battling terminal cancer. Dr. Jensen died within three weeks of my visit.

In addition, Patricia Bragg stopped by the PWA exhibit, and that was a treat. I love the Bragg’s organic salad dressing and have been a fan for a long time. We turned the video cameras on and I told Patricia that her late father, Paul Bragg was another health hero of mine. I described how I end many of my talks by mentioning the effect that Paul Bragg had on others and eventually myself. Patricia won’t tell us how old she is, but she looks vibrantly healthy and still wears the flowery hat that you see pictured on the bottles of Bragg’s salad dressings. I hear that she still leads exercises on Waikiki Beach in Hawaii with whoever shows up. She said that she always wears that distinctive hat because actor Jack Lord of ‘70s-era “Hawaii Five-O” TV show told her one time: “Patricia, you may be only five feet, but if you wear a hat, you will be six feet tall.”

I enjoyed seeing Melissa Gertz, who flew out from Ohio to join us at Expo West. Melissa was part of the Health Toledo initiative one year ago when we were trying out an abbreviated version of the Perfect Weight America program. Man, did she go to town! She lost 65 pounds over a five-month period, and when I interviewed her for the TV show last June, this amazing mother of two touched me. Melissa, who is tall, was in the 220-pound range but now looks as slim as can be now that she is south of 160 pounds. I like to say that Melissa has become the face of Perfect Weight America. Her slim form is pictured on all our end cap displays that are in hundreds, if not thousands, of stores, and she’s become a great spokesperson. We had her meet sales reps and do interviews with industry magazines. I also admired her discipline: I didn’t see her walking around the convention floor scarfing up free food samples.

I left that to folks like Matt Cullen, who said that if the number of booths were any indication, organic chocolate and organic food bars were well represented at Expo West. Thousands of attendees carried burlap shopping bags—handed out free at the convention—to collect goodie samples by the dozens. One of the most popular booths belonged to Julie’s Organic Ice Cream, which handed out petite ice cream bars and ice cream sandwiches like . . . candy. Of course, you had to eat those treats right away. Matt said he indulged in a couple of great-tasting organic ice cream bars.

You get a chance at these conventions to connect with some great managers and owners of local independent health food stores that I’ve gotten to know over the years. I had a meeting with Tom Tolworthy, CEO of Vitamin Shoppe, who’s become a good friend over the years. We discussed some exciting things that we’re going to be doing with them. We made presentations to all the Whole Foods buyers. I also met with a Chinese botanical research company to talk about some exciting projects in the future.

All in all, a worthwhile convention.