Joining Rikard today on the Greenhero Podcast is David Pannell, co-founder of Vegan Business Tribe, a community for plant-based entrepreneurs that helps grassroots vegan businesses get off the ground.

David’s vegan journey started purely through an effort to improve his diet. It actually took him close to 10 years to make a complete transition through meat and dairy reduction. But initially, he found himself gravitating towards unhealthy foods during his time working in a corporate business. But once he began eating vegetarian, he found himself following a rabbit hole of sorts. He came upon a video of male chicks being treated as a waste product in the UK, which ignited his passion for veganism. With his transitory period turning out the way it did, he feels strongly that there is no moral high ground to take over those who are pre-vegan. As he puts it, none of us were born vegan. We started out in the exact same place as everybody else. Now, he and his partner share that mentality through business practice, helping brands understand the consumer journey and the prominence of flexitarianism. The vegan sector has seen massive growth because of it. Especially where David is located in Europe–the idea of veganism is no longer new, and has started to mature.

The Vegan Business Tribe was founded in part, thanks to a spark from a UK vegan activist who pointed out that just because you’ve turned vegan doesn’t mean the impact of animal agriculture was halted and harmful practices have stopped, you’ve just opted out of it. With that in mind, David and his partner realized they could utilize their expertise in growing markets in bolstering vegan businesses. In doing so, they began to work with large brands, understanding the money wasn’t there with individual, smaller-sized companies. However, through collective effort, they could move the vegan scene forward.

A primary hurdle David sees with his clients is they build a business for themselves, not their customers. Spending thousands of dollars on branding, websites, etc. before you have a client base is just a guess. David helps these businesses get their product or service into the hands of customers as soon as possible to start building that following. The approach for growth depends on the business owner as well, with some only having high gear and others taking a less aggressive method. David uses his own business, Vegan Business Tribe, as an example. It was free for a period of time while they built an audience, then he was able to step back and calculate what he wanted to monetize. It was about community first, and as he puts it, it isn’t about the location that brings us together, it’s about ethics. With this global reach and philosophy, he was able to see growth.

The trends David sees in the vegan marketplace aren’t exactly what you’d expect. Only 50% of his clients have anything to do with food or drink. He is seeing people with existing skills–web designers, programmers, and even lawyers, taking their skillset and applying them to a vegan cause. He’s found that everyone wants an ethical, environmentally conscious supplier and partner. In fact, larger companies can look for such branding as a way to reduce their own impact.

Things you’ll learn

None of us were born vegan. We started out in the exact same place as everybody else.

Moving the vegan mission forward toward a more ethical world means utilizing the skills you already have and applying them to veganism.

Much of the vegan market isn’t food and drink–there are shadow industries around vegan brands that include a plethora of careers.

Links

https://veganbusinesstribe.com/

https://veganbusinesstribe.com/content/podcast/

Today on the Greenhero Podcast, Rickard is joined by Dr. Sunni Patel, founder of Dish Dash Deets, as well as a scientist and gut health influencer that has made it his mission to come up with amazing plant-based recipes and lifestyle plans to help fight gut issues. Dr. Sunni has been featured on Ready Steady Cook, Newsround, and BBC Radio shows. He has helped many people improve problems such as fatigue, mood, immunity, gut, and other health issues using creative evidence-based advice paired with culinary planning and plant-based cooking.

Sunni has been living with inflammatory bowel disease and Crohn's disease since 2014, a condition that is often surrounded by taboo, insecurity, and mental and physical pain. He navigated those challenges until he had a lightbulb moment, as a healthcare professional, he had to turn toward his diet. He cut out dairy and other inflammatory foods before switching to a completely plant-based diet and hasn’t looked back since. Through his personal experience, he made the decision to retrain and utilize his Ph.D. to take a holistic, scientific approach to people’s health with their food and lifestyles. His philosophy is grounded in science and elevated by experience. He works with corporate leaders facing burnout, and people living with IBS and IBD and helps them improve their gut and overall health.

Gut health, Dr. Sunni reminds us, isn’t just in the stomach. It starts when food enters the body to when it exits. There are certainly ultra-processed foods that impact the bacteria in our gut and create symptoms that many people deem embarrassing, further worsening the problems they’re experiencing. It isn’t just “junk food,” though. It can be overhydration or reduction in fiber. He goes on to note that it isn’t just the foods we consume, but our lifestyle influences our gut health as well. Stress management, addictive behaviors, and using addictive substances (yes, caffeine!) all make a difference in the levels of different bacteria in our gut. It impacts people of all ages and genders, but that data is reliant on who feels comfortable seeking out the help they need. Typically, Dr. Sunni works with people who have been on this journey for a while but are in a place where they are seeking a more functional expert who can help them improve their quality of life without making massive sacrifices.

So, where does a plant-based diet come into play? It’s been proven that having a fiber-rich diet can help alleviate symptoms of IBS and IBD, but beyond fiber, a plant-based diet covers a gamut of health-related areas, providing vital polyphenols, antioxidants, and flavonoids that can be of benefit to people living with chronic, non-communicable diseases like diabetes, cancer, obesity, and heart disease.

Dr. Sunni and his partner have just launched Queer Health Foundation, which incorporates lifestyle medicine and community to a cohort of individuals who experience many health inequalities. It is meant to allow for more education for practitioners and provide access to services for those that are vulnerable free of charge within the queer community.

Things you’ll learn

It’s been proven that having a fiber-rich diet can help alleviate symptoms of IBS and IBD, but beyond fiber, a plant-based diet covers a gamut of health-related areas.

Gut health, Dr. Sunni reminds us, isn’t just in the stomach. It starts when food enters the body to when it exits.

It isn’t just the foods we consume, but our lifestyle influences our gut health as well. Stress management, addictive behaviors, and using addictive substances (yes, caffeine) all make a difference in the levels of different bacteria in our gut.

Links

https://www.dishdashdeets.com/

@drsunnipatel

On this episode, Rikard is talking with Liz Ross, Founder and Executive Director of Rethink Your Food Inc., a nonprofit focused on change towards a plant-based diet primarily among Caribbean people in the Caribbean region and the diaspora. She is a recipe developer who has created over 90 recipes for the Vegan Caribbean Kickstart project and has worked with catering/food service companies interested in adding plant-based options to their menu.

Liz was born and raised in Trinidad & Tobago, where her family owns land and grows crops. With that background, Liz then went on to spend more time in the agriculture space when she completed the regenerative farming and food systems farmer apprenticeship program at the University of California Santa Cruz, Center for Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems, on their 30-acre organic farm and intentional community, later getting her Bachelor in Science degree from James Madison University and studying permaculture at Occidental Arts and Ecology Center.

With so many significant sources of influence, including her own experience with health changes, Liz continued her trend by making an impact through Rethink Your Food Inc. She also founded conferences where she truly saw the diversity within the plant-based community. She also saw a lack of initiatives and available resources of information. From those three pillars, she found the mission of Rethink Your Food Inc., acting as a way in which people can get reference information to help promote policy change and institutional change. In addition, she founded the project Vegan Caribbean Kickstart, a tool that enables people to make better food choices and help build a movement, while celebrating Caribbean and Caribbean-Latin American plant-based food culture. It provides a space in which people can experience going to the market, picking their food in the backyard, which is common in the Caribbean, and the experience of cooking and the experience of communicating with others throughout that process.

The experience for Caribbean people living in the US and those in the Caribbean is different, but shares a lot of the same trends. As the diets are primarily higher in meat products, it comes down to ease and education. In the US, there is access to Whole Foods and various plant-based products, whereas in the Caribbean there are myths surrounding plant-based diets. However, in both places, where there is convenient food, people will go. By adapting the Vegan Caribbean program to incorporate cooking, the menu becomes adaptable to what is available to better serve both the US, who may not have traditional ingredients and people in the Caribbean, who may not know what is available to them. The response has been positive and comes from all over the world, both Caribbean natives and immigrants.

The driving force for these individuals to sign up for the program varies across two major motives: health and animal welfare. All of Liz’s messaging surrounds the two and helps people connect their morals to the way they eat. It’s about a holistic connection to the community, the land, and those that inhabit it.

Things You’ll Learn

The experience for Caribbean people living in the US and those living in the Caribbean is different but shares a lot of the same trends. It comes down to ease and education.

Vegan Caribbean Kickstart provides a space in which people can experience going to the market, picking their food, and the experience of cooking.

Ethics play a major role for many–often individuals were vegan or pescetarian before they knew the words existed. It’s about a holistic connection to the community, the land, and those that inhabit it.

LINKS

https://vegancaribbeankickstart.com/

https://rethinkyourfood.org/