Message from the founder

Hi 👋 I’m Johnny,

I’ll never forget the long walks back home from Food4Less— my poor neighborhood's resident grocery store. I remember having to switch the milk jug from one hand to another after one got tired from its weight. I remember having to constantly change my grip of the bags because the plastic handles would narrow into my hand and cut off my circulation. If you’ve never been inside of a Food4Less, allow me to paint the picture. The first thing you see when you enter are literal piles of processed food in crates. If you pull the wrong food, you may cause an avalanche of ramen noodles and canned mac-n-cheese. This is no experience unique to me, but one that is common among communities that are low-income. Processed foods are completely normal.

Raised by a single mom, we had to make things work with what we had. And the “have” part is where the problem lies. Growing up, I didn’t know what organic food even was, and it certainly wasn’t offered in our local grocery store. Imagine this shared reality for hundreds of thousands of folks, through generations of folk that live in food deserts-– they don’t have access to normal food.

And so, I’ve always been passionate about increasing access, but it’s a multi-factorial problem. I ultimately realized that if we are to increase access to real healthy food, we have to support the source— our local organic farmers. Much like underserved communities are being suffocated by processed food, our local organic farmers are being suffocated by market pressure. They’re being urged to compromise their nutrition quality and land stewardship for profit. 

I am more than driven to do my part in fixing these problems. So, I grabbed two friends that are smarter than me, organized a board, did some paperwork and became a non-profit designed to bridge local organic farmers to communities in need of access— Feed The Land!