• To create 100+ jobs that provide personal, professional, and economic growth for those who want it



• To create high quality products or services that our customers value
• To generate revenue and mission fulfillment for our nonprofit partner
• To enhance the communities we operate in
• To generate reusable seed money to invest in other businesses that support our mission
• To inspire others to change the way they look at people impacted by the criminal justice system and emulate what we are doing

Last week, after we made the decision to jump head first into the local food distribution / wash and chop business, we immediately turned our attention to potential locations. Curiously, Jes met Mike from Organic Food Incubator at a conference earlier in the week, and by Thursday morning we were on a tour.

Organic Food Incubator is an amazing space run by the inspiring entrepreneurs who founded BAO Fresh Kombucha. Any food start-up would be lucky to share a home with Mike, Mike, Peter, and the rest of their crew as they take over the NYC  healthy beverage market with their delicious products.

Right now, we are trying to figure out if this space will meet our needs. No matter what, this is an amazing opportunity for any food entrepreneur. Please forward the Organic Food Incubator’s information to anyone who is starting a food business in NY - especially those who need certified organic space.

Below is a description of the Incubator along with BAO’s twitter info.

“Organic Food Incubator is a newly renovated, well-lighted, clean and spacious commercial kitchen space in Long Island City has been configured as New York City’s only Organic Food Incubator™ (OFI). The facility is available to rent for organic and non-organic food and drink companies who are in need of access to a NYS Department Agriculture and Markets commercially licensed, USDA organic and kosher certified kitchen to help grow their business.”

Like Organic Food Incubator on Facebook

@DrinkBAO / Like BAO Kombucha on Facebook

The End of Snacks

In our last post we showed some details of the product development process for our healthy and locally sourced “snack pack” that moms and kids would both enjoy.

While Product development is fun, we quickly realized that it can take a really long time, especially without food product experience or one of “grandma’s secret recipes.” Also, we learned that artisanal food product production is generally mechanized and outsourced once a product reaches scale to avoid expensive facility build-outs. This was very unattractive to us because of our social mission of employing large numbers of people coming home from prison.  

Even though we strongly believe there is a need for healthier snacks in the market, we decided to pull the plug on our snack pack project.

Our Fearless Leader

Luckily, the demise of our snack packs coincided with some great news: Jes Rooks came on-board as the new President and CEO of Spring Into Action!

Jes has brought focus, passion, good vibrations, curiosity, and twenty years of experience as an all-star in environmental and re-entry related non-profits. With Jes at the helm, we have worked diligently to figure out what business to start, and we are happy to have made a decision just last week.

The Decision

Keeping with the local food theme, we will start a business that addresses the challenges restaurants, institutions, and schools face when they want to buy high quality and safe locally grown produce all year round that consistently arrives on time. We will do this by starting a distribution company that also sanitizes, chops, and packages vegetables ready to be eaten.

We are thrilled with this decision because we all love local food and can’t wait to help connect small and medium farms with the enormous market for food in New York City. The entire team has full to-do lists and we aim to be operating by January 2012.

Blog

This blog will expand on how we discovered this business model, and the adventures we go through as we get things started. You can expect more frequent posts from our whole team. Also, we will be tweeting @SpringActionNYC  and updating our facebook page so please follow/like us if you haven’t already.