25: Adam Grogan, President at Greenleaf Foods: The Future of Protein Is Now
Adam Grogan is the President of Greenleaf Foods, a portfolio of leading plant-based protein brands including Lightlife Foods and Field Roast that are transforming the future of food. Greenleaf Foods, SPC is a wholly owned, independent subsidiary of Maple Leaf Foods Inc, a one hundred year old iconic brand headquartered in Toronto, Canada. Adam leads Greenleaf’s strategic direction, financial performance, innovation, customer development and distribution. In this episode, he shares how Greenleaf plans to become the world’s most sustainable plant-based protein company on earth, how and why consumer purchasing habits are changing, and how to anticipate and capture emerging marketplace opportunities to accelerate business growth and a regenerative future.
23: Seth Goldman, Co-Founder and Chief Change Agent of Eat the Change: Creating The Future of Food
Seth Goldman is the, Co-Founder and Chief Change Agent of Eat the Change which is a food company focusing on sustainable and plant-based ingredients to empower us to, “eat the change you wish to see in the world.” Before co-founding, Eat The Change Seth was the Founder of Honest Tea the multi-million organic tea company that was acquired by Coca-Cola in 2011 and is Chair of the board of Beyond Meat the plant-based meat substitutes company. In this conversation, Seth talks about why he is passionate about the future of food, and his optimism about good and sustainable food.
10: Bolthouse Farms’ Jeff Dunn Discusses Empathetic Leadership and Plant-Based Foods
Jeff Dunn cut his teeth at Coca Cola and gained even more experience in the food industry with the Campbell Soup Company. But where he found his passion was becoming CEO of Bolthouse Farms, a packaged foods company that grew out of a small Michigan farm in 1915. In fact, that passion led him to buy the company back from Campbell’s after selling it to them in 2012. In this episode of Lead With We, I had the pleasure of speaking with Jeff about how differences in company culture led to the buy-back and taking an agile approach to consumer packaged goods. Plus, we discuss how the enormous demand for plant-based foods is reshaping our food system and how COVID opened up a conversation between Jeff and his leadership team about empathy.
6: How Thistle’s Ashwin Cheriyan Motivates People To Make Better Choices For Themselves and the Planet
Ashwin Cheriyan took the leap into entrepreneurship with his wife, Shiri Avnery, when he started the plant-based meal delivery service, Thistle, in 2013. He was a former corporate lawyer, and she was a climate-scientist frustrated by how little people were talking about the environmental impact of reducing demand for animal products, let alone the impact on human health. They knew that getting people to shift their eating habits meant making plant-based meals more delicious and convenient. In this episode of Lead With We, Ashwin and I talk about how his personal connection to healthy food has sustained him through the inevitable ups and downs of entrepreneurship, motivating consumers to make better choices, and so much more.
2: Futurist Sally Uren: How Volatility Unlocks Positive Change
Thanks for joining us for another season of Lead With We. I couldn’t think of a better guest to kick things off than my dear friend, futurist Sally Uren. Sally runs a leading sustainability non-profit called Forum For The Future that works directly with big brands and business leaders to create global change. Together we discuss the future of humanity (literally), and how we’re seeing very different trajectories play out simultaneously in real-time. And what I particularly love about this conversation is that Sally points to growing movements, such as regenerative agriculture and impact investing, as proof that we can build a positive future through our actions.