We’re Paige and Mason. The Bend Banner is our way of keeping tabs on this wild, beautiful place we call home. To the mornings that start with coffee and mountain air, the trails that somehow always lead to a brewery, and the kind of small-town stories that remind you why you chose to live here in the first place.

Bends Purple Season

We had a stack of lavender from Tumalo Lavender sitting around the house before they went into the Summer Mailer envelopes, and the whole place has smelled incredible ever since. Just a handful of packets on a shelf, and every room smells like it.

That got me looking around my own yard, where I've got at least ten lavender plants doing their thing right now. Then I looked down the street. Same story. Half the yards on my block have a patch of it going, and this time of year, the whole neighborhood smells like it. Walk out your front door on a warm evening, and it just hits you.

Turns out that's not a coincidence. Lavender actually makes sense here in a way a lot of yard plants don't. It's drought tolerant, so it barely needs water in a place that doesn't have much to spare. Deer mostly leave it alone too. And anyone who's tried to keep a garden alive in this town knows that's not nothing. It handles our high desert winters fine once it's established. Basically, it's one of the few plants that looks good, smells better, and doesn't ask much of you. No wonder it ended up everywhere.

Fifteen minutes out past Tumalo, that same idea just gets scaled way up. There's a ten-acre farm growing over ten thousand lavender plants across twenty varieties, one of the few certified organic lavender farms in the whole Pacific Northwest. Right now, the fields hit peak bloom, purple, white, and pink rows stretching out under the sun. It's a small family operation, women-run, distilling their own oil and turning it into soaps, lotions, even scone mix, all grown right there in the field.

So between the farm and every third front yard in town, Bend's kind of quietly become a lavender place. It softens the whole town a little. Cuts against the sagebrush and lava rock with something soft and purple and good-smelling.

If you want to see it at full scale, Tumalo Lavender is hosting its first-ever Lavender Festival on Saturday, August 1st, from 10 am to 4 pm. Free to attend, U-pick lavender, local artisans, food trucks, live music. Worth the drive just to stand in a field that smells like that. Trust me.

And if you were one of the folks who got the Summer Mailer, you've already got a little piece of it sitting in your house right now.

This Week’s Conditions
☀️ Sunrise: 5:42 am
🌅 Sunset: 8:40 pm
High Temp: 90°F
AQI: 163 as of this morning :(
Local Fire Report

Bend Business Spotlight

After 25 years teaching Spanish in classrooms, from middle school to university, the founder of Gringo Language Academy decided to get selfish: work only with students who actually want to learn Spanish, not just those checking a box. What started as one-on-one tutoring has grown into a full online language school with a real Bend presence, nearly 20 live sessions a week and almost-weekly local events.

So we asked Jennifer of Gringo Language Academy a few questions that might help some other folks with their local business:

Where do customers actually come from today?

Obviously, many of our favorite customers learned about us through local newsletters. The rest have definitely been a mix of social media, word of mouth, local MeetUp group events we have organized, and business cards left in coffee shops. Our offering is unique, so finding "the one perfect way to market" our services has been tricky.

What's the one thing that's worked better than expected?

Newsletter sponsorships have definitely been a fun way to gain some traction, both locally and in other, more far-flung corners of the interwebs. It's wonderful to meet people who say, "Hey, I read about you this week!" The ability to stay in someone's inbox, as opposed to just a brief glance while doom scrolling, is significant.

What's a real business number you're comfortable sharing?

Our own weekly newsletter (La Chispa, your weekly "spark" of Spanish) is slowly growing its audience - our readership has grown over 30% in the last few months, and we have an average open rate of over 50%, which is a great feeling, though it puts the pressure on to keep the quality high so as to push those numbers even higher as well.

What would you tell someone starting a business in Central Oregon?

This stuff isn't easy, but I truly feel like we lucked out starting this adventure here. I cannot imagine finding a more supportive community of mentors, fellow entrepreneurs, supportive merchants and vendors, and - of course - customers to help us build our community here at Gringo Language Academy.

🐾Bend’s Best Good Boys & Good Girls 🐾

🐶 Beau – 3 years, Lab Retriever Mix
Beau is an energetic lover who will need plenty of exercise and cuddles.

🐱 Mishka – 2 Years - Mix
Mishka is settling in slow and steady. She's a little fearful right now, but she's already housetrained and used to living with cats and horses. Give her patience, and she'll give you her trust.

🐱 King – 1 year - Bulldog Mix
King showed up as a stray and loves to be pet and loved on. A one-story house is better, as he struggles to do stairs.