Tuesday, January 07, 2014

"Why Immigrants Should Invest In The Coming Midwestern Food Renaissance"

Rich Schell is an Illinois attorney and a very good writer on the subject of food and agriculture businesses.

Rich just posted a new piece to his blog, Schell Acres titled, "Why Immigrants Should Invest In The Coming Midwestern Food Renaissance".

A core of his idea is that there are four vital pieces for any entrepreneurial venture:  Founder/mission, Marketing, Making, and Money

Along with our Innovation Kitchen work, Rich brings in some very well known names in the world of entrepreneurship and enterprise into his piece:  Peter Drucker ("The man who invented management" - Businessweek), Ernesto Sirolli (The Sirolli Institute),  Paul Ray (Cultural Creatives) and Jenny Kassan, (Cutting Edge Capital).

Good company!  What I'm most proud of are the good words Rich shares about our work (emphasis added):

"Marketing:  Niche markets and a lot of them made possible by the fragmentation of the mass market in food and agriculture and the rise of the internet and foodies."

"Making:   Wholistic, Bio Based Organizations that are nimble, quick and niched like Rick Terrien's Innovation Kitchen that allows for the "Democratization of Food"-- small runs of batch products that are still FDA compliant. The internet makes it possible to fragment the mass market into a million pieces, and put the pieces and products together in new and profitable niches that have a margin, and that people buy to be different and not the same as everyone else."

This is exactly the path we're taking with our work at Innovation Kitchens.  We've been able to set up the pathways and maps that allow small farms, food businesses and entrepreneurs to create profitable niche food lines and new brands.  Both farms and consumers benefit and it's making some great jobs for people with disabilities along the way.

Thanks to Rich for the good words!

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