Since their discovery, antibiotics have significantly decreased the deadly repercussions of bacterial infections. Infections caused by antibiotic resistant organisms, however, are on the rise and are a major health threat (Ghosh et al., 2019). Resistance comes from excessive exposure or overuse by the medical community, and inappropriate use by patients such as not completing a treatment regime (Munita & Arias, 2015). The increase in infections caused by multidrug resistant bacteria spurred research into forms of treatment other than antibiotics. Clinical and in vitro studies by Warnke et al. (2009) have shown bactericidal effects with many plant essential oils, even against multidrug resistant strains such as MRSA.  Essential oils are concentrated, volatile plant extracts produced by mechanical pressing and steam distillation (Siddeeg et al., 2018). Peppermint (Mentha piperita) essential oil, reported by Rezaei et al. (2020), showed antimicrobial properties against Enterococcus faecalis, Actinomyces viscosus, and Streptococcus sanguinis.  S. sanguinis most recognized for its pathology in periodontal disease. This study investigates the potential use of peppermint essential oil as an antimicrobial agent to kill or prevent the growth of Staphylococcus aureus. An antibiotic profile of S. aureus was completed using Mueller-Hinton Agar and 20 antibiotic candidates. The profile determined which antibiotic will be used as a positive control for further testing. The antibiotic profile showed that Imipenem had the highest percent variation from the standard Zone Of Inhibition (ZOI) of resistance for S. aureus and will be used as the positive control. Next steps in this study include: a disk diffusion carrier oil assay, disk diffusion microdilution assay of peppermint oil, subculturing all resistance ZOI, and a verification assay growing S. aureus on plates containing various concentrations of peppermint oil. This study will determine if peppermint oil can be effectively used as a non-antibiotic treatment to control S. aureus infections.