From The Ground Up

About From The Ground Up

What does it take to pursue food and beverage as a career? What have culinary entrepreneurs sacrificed to follow their passion? Each week, From The Ground Up provides a platform for diverse voices across the industry to share their personal journeys – the triumphs, the failures, and the raw unexpected stories in between. Follow @fromthegrounduppod on Instagram for show news and more. Hosted and produced by Danielle Berg.

Publisher

Danielle Berg

Category

arts

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

13 May 2020

Latest episode

4 Dec 2020

Latest episodes

21 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   4 Dec 2020

   Luke Saunders: Making Fresh Food Accessible At Farmer’s Fridge

   “We are trying to change the way that people can get access to fresh, healthy food.” Luke Saunders is the founder of Farmer’s Fridge, the omni channel fresh food business. He likes to call himself a ‘small business entrepreneur’ - in college, he founded a bike rental company, sold it when he graduated and then went on to work at a small family business making industrial grease lubricants in Queens. After his left his gig at the industrial grease company, he took a job as a traveling sales man for a metal finishing company, which is what inspired his concept for this Farmer’s Fridge. As a traveling sales man, Luke was driving over 1,000 miles a week across four states and during his constant travels, realized he couldn’t get anything he wanted to eat on the road. Everything was fast food. He wondered - why isn’t there more fresh grab and go meals outside of these more dense urban locations? Luke quickly recognized the supply chain problem - food manufacturers can make food very safely and efficiently but getting it from factory to gas station could take six months because of the way supply chain works. Once Luke realized that he could connect directly to customers and create his own distribution model, then he could solve the problem of getting fresh healthy food to more people. With that, Farmer’s Fridge was born. Prior to the pandemic, Farmer’s Fridge was really all about fridges (what?!). Yes, fridges. Farmer’s Fridges makes fresh, delicious food at a central commissary kitchen then put that food in their own refridgerated trucks and then take that food to fancy “vending machines” that they call fridges. The fridges are in airports, universities, office buildings and more across the Midwest and East Coast. The whole purpose was to try and change the way that people can get access to fresh, healthy food. A vending machine is convenient, it can go places restaurants can’t go and it would allow them to be really efficient about getting food to people so it could be less expensive. Once COVID hit, Farmer’s Fridge launched a DTC business where they leverage that same infrastructure around production and distribution of food but they drop it at your house (yes please)! In this episode, we cover how Luke came up with the idea of fresh food vending machines, how his mission has driven this business, launching a new arm of Farmer’s Fridge and of course, the types of dishes they offer. Tune in and follow @farmersfridge on Instagram!

2. 

   27 Nov 2020

   Emily Griffith: Building Lil Bucks

   Emily Griffith shares her story of starting and building America’s sprouted buckwheat brand - Lil Bucks. While living in Australia, Emily had a life changing açaí bowl that inspired her to build a brand of her own. The bowl had sprouted buckwheat seeds as a replacement to granola that's usually sprinkled on top - it was not too sweet, had the perfect crunch and soon became her new obsession. Once Emily noticed there were no dedicated sprouted buckwheat brands here in the U.S., she decided to launch Lil Bucks. Once she moved back to Chicago after living in Australia, she took on freelance gigs to bootstrap her business. Emily went from selling at local farmers markets to selling in major retail stores across the U.S. In this episode, Emily chats with host Danielle about buckwheat production, bootstrapping a business, the realities of being a food entrepreneur and fulfilling her vision of creating a national, natural health brand. Tune in and follow @lovelilbucks on Instagram and use code fromthegrounduppod on www.lovelilbucks.com (http://www.lovelilbucks.com/) for 20% off your first purchase!

3. 

   30 Oct 2020

   Vanessa Price: Big Macs & Burgundy

   Vanessa Price first got into wine in Louisville, Kentucky, where she was born and raised. She originally moved to New York to go to school for theater and film but shortly after, moved back home to Louisville to get her Bachelor’s degree. During her off days from school on the weekends, Vanessa worked at a winery in downtown Louisville and that’s where she fell in love with the culture of wine. Since then, Vanessa has worked on all sides of the industry - she has spent 15 years in the wine industry as a trained sommelier, she authored New York magazine’s hit “Wine Pairing of the Week,” worked on the import and distribution side and founded The Vinum Collective, an all-things wine platform from education to e-commerce. Most recently, Vanessa released her debut book, Big Macs and Burgundy: Wine Pairings for the Real World and she is currently working on building a new restaurant and boutique hotel in Montauk, New York called Mavericks. In this episode, we talk all about Vanessa’s approach to the world of wine, how she got into wine in Louisville Kentucky, writing her first book and we even discuss why and how Cheetos and Sancerre make the perfect pair. Tune in and be sure to follow Vanessa Price on Instagram @vanessalenoreprice and check out her new book at www.bigmacsandburgundy.com.

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

5.0 / 5

36 ratings

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Guest appearances

Books guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.