business spotlight


Nature’s Treasures Rockin’ Austin Since 2000


by Sheila Julson T


he proverb, “a rolling stone gathers no moss,” is frequently used today to refer to those who stay active to


avoid stagnation. For Karen Richards, her wanderlust and independent spirit kept her on the move, taking her from coast to coast throughout the United States to live, work and play. She has worked in and owned businesses in real estate, color copy services, and retail offi ce furniture and supplies. Richards eventually found her calling


with Nature’s Treasures, her Austin-based business featuring rocks, fossils, minerals, crystals, home decor, jewelry, oils, smudge, and metaphysical books and card decks. T e store’s Rock Depot and Yard off ers bulk rock and lapidary equipment and ser- vices. With an event space and a metaphys- ical practitioner program rounding out Nature’s Treasures off erings, the business will celebrate its 20-year anniversary in Au- gust. Richards, along with retail manager Michael Kallstrom—who was a customer at Nature’s Treasures as a teen—refl ects on how the store has grown into Austin’s go-to source for all things rock and stone.


A Love of Nature Since Childhood Richards’ father had worked in construc- tion, and her family frequently moved to various job sites. A stay on a family farm in Indiana is where she developed a true pas- sion for the natural world. “When you move every year, you become very independent,” she affi rms. “I was always close to nature and felt connected to Mother Nature.” While working for a corporate real estate


agency in California during the 1980s, Rich- ards liked the set hours and routine schedule, but she missed that sense of independence from owning her own agency. To fi nd solace, she went to Tucson, Arizona—known for its annual International Gem, Mineral & Fossil Show—to buy rocks. By the dawn of the 1990s, Richards was ready to move on from the corporate real estate world. She relocated to Texas and brought her rock hobby with her. “It’s hard to make a living selling


rocks, so I started another company so I could make a living, with a spiritual agree- ment that one day, I would make Nature’s Treasures my being,” she relates. “Looking back, even while I was developing the con-


August 8 has been designated


by the city of Austin as "Nature's Treasures Day" to commemorate their 20th anniversary.


8 Austin Area Edition AustinAwakenings.com


cept and the idea in the back of my mind, that spiritual guidance and connection was always there. I just didn’t see it at the time.” Richards’ next venture, Texas Offi ce


Product Supplies (TOPS), specialized in offi ce furniture and supplies. She displayed her rock pieces around the business space. “I started putting pieces on the desk and on bookshelves,” she says. “People who came into my offi ce supply shop would buy a desk and buy a mineral.” Aſt er the offi ce supply business ran its


course, Richards carved out space for Na- ture’s Treasures inside a TOPS location on Fiſt h Street, as well as her other locations on Kramer and Braker, and in George- town. In 2010, Richards found the current 14,000-square-foot location on Interstate Highway 35, in Austin, where she could bring all three locations under one roof. A native Austinite, Kallstrom always


got good grades in school and was valedic- torian of his high school class. To reward him for getting straight A’s, his mother took him on mini fi eld trips. “I either wanted to go to a comic book store, or go to Nature’s Treasures,” he recalls. He started working at Nature’s


Treasures in the summer of 2005, aſt er his freshman year of college. “And I just stuck around,” laughs Kallstrom, who originally planned to major in epidemiology, but later realized he didn’t want to work in a stressful laboratory. “T rough an introductory geol- ogy class, I rediscovered a passion for rocks and minerals. I saw potential for a career, so I switched gears and started studying geol- ogy and took a natural liking to it,” he says. Kallstrom has a Bachelor of Science in


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