Business of the Month: LifeThyme Natural Market, 410 Sixth Avenue

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When you shop at a market, you notice its selection, read its prices, experience its customer service, and know the quality of familiar products. But beyond that and hidden from view lie guesswork and even unspoken questions about the economic relationship that your purchases support and the kind of world that they are helping create. Does your dollar get re-spent nearby, helping bolster the local economy, or does it get syphoned off by a remote corporation to ultimately be transformed into shareholder value? Are you paying for a bundle of ethical production choices or are you taking a discount based on some form of exploitation? These are large and difficult questions that we often lack both the mental energy and time to entertain. Luckily for those of us paralyzed by these imponderables, there are independent, local markets that grapple with these precise issues for us as part of their ethos. And our June 2025 Business of the Month, LifeThyme Natural Market (410 6th Avenue, between W 8th and W9th Streets) has been just that kind of market for Greenwich Village for over thirty years.

The story of LifeThyme Natural Market begins, improbably, with Revlon and one of its sales representatives, Stuart Bander. Bander’s portfolio in the 1960s and ‘70s included health supplements. And these came to mind when a friend called his attention to retail spaces that CVS had been turning down. Bander saw there an opportunity for opening health food stores, which remained a scarce to non-existent resource in many neighborhoods. So, starting in the late 1970s, he did just that, under the name Good n’ Natural. Some of his branches remain in operation today.

Bander lived in midtown and never took much notice of the Village until his son Jason moved there after college. One day, he swung by and asked his son to join him on a walk to check out spaces for a store he had in mind. It would be modelled on the Massachusetts store Bread & Circus, the largest natural food retailer at the time in the Northeast (and acquired by Whole Foods in 1992). He found his spot in a boarded up 6th Avenue building. There were a number of small health food stores nearby back then; but not of the size and breadth that Bander had in mind. His store would offer organic produce, dietary supplements, groceries, prepared food, a bakery, and a juice bar. And in 1995, it launched under the name LifeThyme Natural Market.

The store opened as an all-purpose nature store, and its concept has remained the same ever since. Over time, however, as Jason became more involved in the store’s management, he brought with him a perspective that shaped the evolution of the store. For one, he lived right across the street, and was firmly attuned to the beat of the neighborhood, noticing right away the threat posed by emerging corporate competitors and by shifts in local demographics and shopping habits. For another, he had lived for a period of his youth on a farm in Vermont, had a deep familiarity with the operation and economics of independent farms, and felt a strong commitment to support small, local producers. It did not take long for Jason’s outlook to become instrumental to the store’s longevity and success.

By the time Jason joined LifeThyme full-time in 2004, the store counted among its growing number of competitors a Whole Foods just a few blocks away in Chelsea and would soon have a second Whole Foods even closer, by Union Square. On top of that, the health product market had grown exponentially and many early niche products like Kiss My Face and Burt’s Bees (which was acquired by Clorox in 2007) could now be found just about anywhere, and not exclusively at places like LifeThyme. To confront these challenges, Jason decided to differentiate his store by doubling down on its commitment to small, local producers and to emerging ethical brands. This has kept LifeThyme at the cutting edge of the natural product retail landscape. Over the years, the store has helped build the brands of dozens of fledgling producers and their distributors. Vita Coco, Sambazon, Purely Elizabeth, Mary’s Gone Crackers, and Guayakí are some of the lines that received shelf space here back when few customers knew about them.

Repeatedly taking risks on barely known products would hardly amount to a winning business strategy, were it not for the reputation the store has developed for the quality of its selection. This reputation, in turn, has given Jason greater latitude in working with local farms of which customers might not have heard. He offers as an example the time he decided to replace a well known organic milk brand with a small local alternative.

I know what good milk is; and that [well known brand] is not good milk. It might be organic; but it’s not good milk. I want milk that is 2 to 3 days from the udder to the store, and I want it with the fat. And I don’t care that it’s not organic certified, because I know how much that costs. But my customer doesn’t. So I switched all the milk. And the customers were pissed. But I told them, that’s good milk! Try it.

Those who did try it not only became more educated consumers, but also developed greater trust in the store’s choices.

Customer trust and education, however, only get you so far, because sooner or later, customers move on. This has forced Jason to renew on an ongoing basis his efforts to cultivate conscientious and discerning customers. And this can feel like swimming against the tide. Over the past 15 years, the already considerable challenges of selling products from small and local producers have only mounted. Jason feels that the New York State has made it ever more difficult for small businesses to bring their product affordably to the city. He also notes that customers have become increasingly inclined to consume and experience the neighborhood through their mobile devices instead of through social contact and casual exploration. But LifeThyme is not enduring these developments standing still. As part of its effort to lure in new customers and diversify its operation, the store is reconfiguring the second floor to accommodate a dining space featuring crop-to-keg local beer and cider. It will be ready in a matter of weeks. But that is hardly a reason to delay swinging by to check out the incredible array of produce, natural foods, and health products LifeThyme currently has in store for you. 

For three decades of providing us with healthful products and for holding itself and its customers to a higher ethical standard, we’re thrilled to name LifeThyme Natural Market our June 2025 Business of the Month.

What special small business would you like to see featured next? Just click here to nominate our next one. Thank you! #shoplocalnyc

Here is a map of all our Businesses of the Month: