Adaptonics in Press & Media
From “Eccentric” to a surprisingly long-lived experiment.
When you have been talking publicly about unusual plants for more than ten years, quite a lot accumulates: television, interviews, podcasts, enthusiasm, skepticism—and also a rather nasty FOCUS article.
This page documents this story. Not just the good parts. An archive does not become more credible when you subsequently remove everything that no longer fits the way things look today.
For editors: Contact details, interview topics, and press photos can be found at the end of this page. Everything in between is an archive.
Curro Cachinero in the Healing Garden in Tenerife.
2014 – Right at the beginning
At the time, Adaptonics was still called Healing Garden Tenerife. I began growing Artemisia annua and other plants in Tenerife, produced my first extracts, and tried to find out whether the idea of a Healing Garden could actually become a business.
In 2014, I presented the project in the context of Prof. Günter Faltin’s GründerGarage and launched an initial crowdfunding campaign.
One of our oldest Artemisia videos also dates from this period. In it, Dr. med. Fritz Helmut Hemmerich—today Friðhu—talks, among other things, about Ebola, Marburg, SARS, and the possibility that new pandemics could occur in the future. Six years later, we viewed this conversation differently.
→ 2014 Artemisia video on YouTube
2016 – Kabel Eins: “From Eccentric to Winner”
It became public in January 2016. Kabel Eins launched a new documentary series about founders with the rather restrained title “From Eccentric to Winner”—and Healing Garden Tenerife appeared in the pilot episode.
A camera crew accompanied me in Tenerife and later in Germany. Artemisia. Rockrose. Pine Pollen. Festivalgoers. Tinctures and a hotel director with a rather foolish expression.
And, of course, the RTL Breakfast Television headline that will probably follow me to the end of my days, whether or not it makes the front page of Bild.
“Millionaire with tree sperm?”
They meant Pine Pollen.
The episode aired on January 5, 2016. After that, our small online shop was initially overrun with orders.
Original sources and reports
- Official Kabel Eins press release from January 3, 2016
- Episode guide: “From Eccentric to Winner,” episode 1
- German startups: Kabel Eins backs founders
- Production company gut.tut.gut
- Startup humor: Healing Garden Tenerife
- Our own blog post from January 6, 2016
Not every press outlet was friendly
The morning after the broadcast, a TV column by Gregor Dolak appeared on FOCUS Online. Let’s put it this way: He wasn’t convinced.
The article delved into my biography with astonishing detail and described my path in life at the time, among other things, as a “failed existence”. Associations with “quacks,” “druids,” and esotericism were also unavoidable.
→ FOCUS Online: “From Fire Igloos to Magic Potion”
Of course, I could take the article apart sentence by sentence today. But that would be boring.
Some of what I said about plants back then I would indeed formulate much more precisely today. Other parts were simply an attempt to explain an unusual idea in three sentences on a television program.
What ever became of this “nutcase”?
The Healing Garden still exists. It became Adaptonics. More than 10,000 people have now bought from us, and more than 25,000 orders are documented.
And I am still working on Artemisia, Pine Pollen, Cistus, adaptogens, and the question: What keeps us healthy?
I simply know a lot more today than I did in 2016. And with some things, what I know today above all is more precisely what I don’t know.
That is why the old FOCUS article does not need to disappear either. It is part of the story. After all, the story continued.
2017 – Suddenly at dm
A year later came a development that hardly anyone could have predicted in 2014: Adaptonics products were on the shelves at dm-drogerie markt.
For this page, this is less a media event than a piece of context. Because almost exactly one year passed between the image painted by part of the press in 2016 and a product appearing in German retail. - How that came about, exactly why the second reorder failed spectacularly at the last second, and why this episode remains one of my most painful yet “instructive mistakes” to this day is another story...
2017: Adaptonics at dm-drogerie markt.
2020 – The pandemic
Then came 2020. And suddenly, topics that we had already been working on for years were being discussed publicly.
Artemisia annua attracted international attention
In April 2020, the Max Planck Institute for Colloids and Interfaces announced that it would investigate Artemisia annua extracts and artemisinin derivatives in cell culture studies against SARS-CoV-2.
Important: A laboratory study is not evidence that Artemisia prevents or treats COVID-19 in humans.
→ Max Planck Society: Artemisia annua in laboratory tests against the coronavirus
In July 2020, FOCUS also reported extensively on Artemisia annua, the debate surrounding “Covid Organics” from Madagascar, and the research that was underway at the time.
→ FOCUS Online: Artemisia and coronavirus research
The fact that FOCUS of all publications reported extensively on Artemisia several years after the “magic potion” article is at least somewhat ironic. Of course, this does not mean that FOCUS thereby confirmed what we said back then. But it shows how quickly the public context can change.
Our own pandemic archive
At Adaptonics, our entire annual supply of Cistus suddenly sold out. I caught one of the last flights back to Tenerife before Spain went into lockdown. Imun Guard emerged from this situation.
→ The Story Behind Cistus and Imun Guard
During the lockdown, another question occupied me: Not only What can a plant do?, but What can we influence ourselves?
- Self-efficacy, stress, and the immune system
- How do you kill a hydra? On antifragility and health
- Sense of coherence: developing an understanding of how things are connected
- World peace is decided in the bedrooms
2020 – Herzkraft Podcast
In October 2020, I was a guest on Sascha Hill's Herzkraft Podcast. We discussed the history of Adaptonics, Pine Pollen, Artemisia, Cistus, Imun Guard—and, as expected, a few other things as well.
From Then Until Today
This page will continue to grow. There is now more than ten years of material: television appearances, interviews, old videos, podcasts, articles, photos, scientific discussions, and occasionally criticism as well.
What we do not want to do is polish the past in retrospect.
We thought this back then.
We know this today.
And sometimes: We got it wrong.
This is how learning works.
Press & Interviews
Are you researching one of our topics or would you like to speak with me? I am generally open to interviews, podcasts, background discussions, and filming.
- Artemisia annua and the story of this plant at Adaptonics
- Pine Pollen
- Cistus / Rockrose
- Adaptogens
- Salutogenesis and self-efficacy
- more than ten years of growing and processing plants in Tenerife
- the story from the Healing Garden to Adaptonics
- Entrepreneurship beyond the classic startup world
- personal experience, traditional plant knowledge, and scientific evidence
Curro Cachinero
Founder of Adaptonics
Tenerife
→ Get in touch · adaptonics@gmail.com
Press Images & Materials
For editorial coverage, we can provide portraits, images from the Healing Garden, historical images, material on pine pollen harvesting, Cistus and Artemisia, photos from dm, as well as product images and archive videos, among other materials, upon request. Please coordinate image rights and sources before publication.
Profile
Adaptonics emerged in 2014 from the Healing Garden in Tenerife. Founder Curro Cachinero has been studying extraordinary plants, plant extracts, adaptogens, and salutogenesis for more than ten years.
What began as an original garden project developed into a small, owner-operated company with more than 10,000 customers. In parallel, an extensive archive of articles, videos, interviews, and scientific sources was created, which is now being restructured and contextualized in Adaptopedia.