When the space between us changes
How Aunt Susie's Granola has become a family affair for these two kindred spirits.
Erica Jensen always loved being with her aunt, Susie.
“I think sometimes people just have a special connection with somebody,” she tells me over lunch in Austin earlier this summer. “And she was always that person for me.”
And the feeling has been mutual, Susie said as we sat in the shade at Sour Duck Market, one of the artisan markets that Erica and her husband, Robert, were visiting on their business trip to Austin for their company, Aunt Susie’s Granola.
Susie explained that there were a few times during Erica’s young adult life when she lived with Susie and her family. “She was like a big sister to my girls,” Susie said.
Those daughters are now grown with their own kids, and Susie, a longtime media executive (and my old boss, more on that below), is now retired and living in Austin. Erica and her husband, Robert, have lived in Northwest Arkansas since 2006.
This aunt-niece duo were close, but a few years ago, a surprising thing brought them even closer: granola.
Here’s the story: In 2018, Susie stepped down from the helm of the Austin American-Statesman, hoping to spend more time with her ailing mother, but her mom died just a few weeks later.
In the wake of these changes, Susie went to yoga teacher training, and at the retreat in Mexico, she fell in love with the granola served at breakfast. When she returned to Austin, she found a story I’d written about DIY granola and decided to try to recreate it at home.
After tinkering over the course of a year, Susie felt like she’d nailed her own granola recipe. She showed Erica how to make it on one of their visits. Erica started making it, a friend wanted to try some, then she wanted to buy some, and the rest is Aunt Susie’s history.
Initially, Susie lent only her name to Aunt Susie’s Granola, but as the business started to grow, she offered more, including traveling to Northwest Arkansas to help them on particularly busy weeks.
At first, the Jensens gave her 5% of sales, but Susie quickly eschewed the payments, offering to work and advise them for free. “I was really proud when she told me the name,” Susie said. “I love that there would be a little bit of a legacy of something that I created.”
Erica spent many years as a stay-at-home parent while dabbling in side projects that almost became big businesses, but she always stepped back right before they got too large to handle. “I thought, ‘I can grow this business or I can be with my kids,’ and I shut it down,” she said.
But the granola has been different. They launched at a farmers’ market in 2021 and then sold their first batches at a store in Siloam Springs. Erica quickly started adding flavors, like birthday cake, blueberry muffin, and bourbon pecan.
They started out baking at home under Arkansas’ cottage laws, but the granola eventually took over the house. They installed a second oven in the sunroom. “We had baking racks everywhere,” Erica said. “You could look nowhere and not see granola.”
These days, she’s busy enough to employ her husband of 23 years and, not one, but two commercial kitchens. They sell granola in 17 states at 45-50 retail shops, as well as online customers who order directly from them and via faire.com. She’s up to 37 flavors and counting.
The Jensens have one kid in college who still needs them, but they are getting more comfortable as empty nesters thinking mostly about their own futures, and not those of their kids.
Both Erica and Susie say that their aunt-niece dynamic has deepened during these past few years of working together. They share an interest in metaphysical practices like reiki, which they studied together during the pandemic, and they spend a lot of time doing strategic planning sessions that bring mindfulness into their business journey.
“One of my main messages has been that you have to have a backup plan for the backup plan. You can’t set it and expect that it’s going to happen that way,” Susie said.
When she’s not helping with Aunt Susie’s Granola or hanging with her grandkids, Susie has her own side hustle, a mala company called Susie’s Sanctuary, where she sells strings of meditation beads.
As we were wrapping up our chat, Susie told us about her expanding into making embroidered and patched vintage clothes, another hobby she’s explored during a decade of her life when she gets to choose how to fill her days.
I asked Susie if this is what she hoped retirement would be like. “Yes, this is exactly what I thought retirement was going to look like,” Susie said. “I can’t sit still.”
“Just like her daddy,” Erica added.
Susie, without a beat: “Just like my daddy. He was cleaning the yard and sold an RV the day he died.”
They both laughed warmly at the memory.
From family to business back to family again.
There’s no doubt that the space between them has changed.
All because of a batch of granola.
Hi, readers!
I met Susie Gray Biehle in 2012, when she was hired as publisher of the Austin American-Statesman. She’d come from USA Today, and we were all very excited to have a high-powered woman in the paper's top position.
I was a 29-year-old newspaper columnist in need of role models like her. She was approachable but well-boundaried, high-powered with…wait, is that a tattoo poking out of her sleeve? A nose piercing?
One day, she showed up for work with blue streaks in her hair, and she sealed the deal. I would never have a boss like her again, and I’d better start paying attention.
We were all sad when she retired because she’d been a great leader during a terrible time, and I was surprised when she returned to the Statesman as a yoga instructor the following year in 2019.
I signed up for her twice-a-week classes, and the space between us changed.
She was no longer “in charge,” but with the humility of a yoga teacher, she commanded a different kind of space.
Earlier this year, I was delighted when Susie, who has been a longtime supporter of this Substack, reached out about Erica’s granola and offered to connect us. Susie knows I’m not so much of a food writer anymore, so I wasn’t sure exactly what kind of a story I wanted to write, but I’m glad this one finally emerged.
It just so happens that I’ve been thinking lately about the distance between us as I’ve been putting together the upcoming zine, whose theme is space.
I took a new approach to making this summer’s zine by cutting and pasting all of the components together, much more like an old-school zine. I loved using Canva, but I wanted to see how this handmade approach worked. Crossing my fingers that it looks OK in print!
Paid subscribers will be getting copies of The Invisible Thread: Space in the coming weeks. (If you are a paid subscriber and I don’t have your address, please fill out this form to share it with me or respond to this email.)
In case you’ve been holding out for one last reason to become a paid subscriber, here’s a special 10% off forever discount. I ordered about 10% more copies of this edition of the zine than the last one, so help me get them out into the world by subscribing below.
Thank you much for your ongoing support, as always! I’ve really enjoyed putting this physical zine together and can’t wait for you to see it.
As I wrote in the introduction to the zine, space is all around us and within us. And we all have special relationships that change shape over time, and I hope this week’s newsletter allows you to appreciate the shape of those changes.
Until next time,
Addie
P.S. If you’re loving The Invisible Thread, make sure you tell your friends! Word-of-mouth recommendations go a long way. Thank you!
What a great story! I love being reminded that our lives can have multiple acts.