Janet Marin, reflected in mirror, is surrounded by soaps and aromatherapy products sold at The Aroma Tree.

Rich-Joseph Facun / Arizona Daily Star

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At first we thought it was a cute little marketing trick: a business card that oozes the smells of essential oils, for a business that makes its own products from those oils.

But actually it's just that everything at The Aroma Tree carries a scent: the business cards, the bank notes, the paper, even the owner.

"They're always fighting to take our bank notes at the bank," laughs Danita Rodriguez, who has run the store since 1999.

The delicious smells of lavender, tea tree, rosemary, frankincense, cocoa, and hundreds more plants and herbs lure you in, entertain your olfactory senses and permeate everything and everyone in there.

The store soaks up business from professional massage therapists, to people off the street wanting a rejuvenating oil or a cream for their dry skin.

Aging and drying: They're the top two issues for Tucsonans, says Rodriguez.

She, along with her two staff members, mix ingredients at a Downtown warehouse, and the products appear on the shelves by way of soaps, hair products, gels and creams. They'll custom-mix and they also do private label for hotels and resorts.

Last year she took over the retail store next to her, doubling her space. Soon she'll add a huge center counter where customers can come and blend their own herbs and oils for burning, adding to their bath, or for massage.

It's kind of like witchcraft, you might say, and Rodriguez agrees. "It's exactly like that."

When the idea for the business came to her, she was a grant writer who'd worked for several nonprofit groups in Tucson.

She and her parents happened to be visiting a store in Flagstaff that sold handmade glycerin soap. Her father walked out of the store with $84 worth of the stuff, and Rodriguez was floored.

"He's this very down-to-earth guy. I thought if he'll do that, lots of other people will."

So she put in an order with the soap maker, bought herself space at a Fourth Avenue Street Fair and prepared to start selling. "I thought I'd make some extra money at fairs on the weekends."

Three days before the fair, the soap maker told her they'd decided against the idea, leaving Rodriguez with a potentially empty booth.

"I thought, 'This is soap, not rocket science.' So I bought a book on soap making at Barnes & Noble, got herbs and oils and fragrances sent overnight from all over the place, and over the next two days I made soap. That first weekend at the fair I sold $9,000 worth of soap."

Business took off, but not before Rodriguez made some changes. She noticed that using plant-based essential oils — as opposed to fragrances with alcohol added — made the products turn out nicer and, she says, had a better effect on skin and hair.

Rodriguez says she cured her own thinning hair by going all-natural. "Six months later my hair was growing in like I was 20 again."

Now a certified aromatherapist, she has extended her own line of products, called Aromatry, to include conditioning hair masks, hydrating face masks, moisturizers and more soaps.

She also carries a couple of other brands, like Pré de Provence French soap and Bonny Doon Farm cologne.

The dark wood cabinets and glass jars give the store the feel of an old apothecary. There are even jars of frankincense and myrrh, sold by the ounce.

The sweet smell of success is evident here, literally. But for the straight-talking, no-nonsense Rodriguez, 36, her ambitions certainly don't stop here.

She wants to develop online sales via her Web site and get into more spas and resorts. She's tweaking her packaging for a big trade show in Las Vegas at the end of the year. "Then I take over the world."