food & agriculture

Today's guest is Maricel Saenz, Founder & CEO of Compound Foods.

Maricel Saenz is the founder and CEO of Compound Foods, a food-tech startup recreating coffee without coffee beans. Maricel and Compound aim to create a sustainable coffee that reduces the negative environmental impact on the planet and ensures we have coffee for the foreseeable future. 

Maricel is a Costa Rica native, passionate about sustainability and coffee. She has a Bachelor of Commerce from The University of British Columbia and attended Singularity University's Global Solutions Program in 2017. Maricel has a background in finance and previously co-founded Nextbiotics, a synthetic biology startup addressing antibiotic resistance. She worked in international development in South Africa, with local entrepreneurs, and in Cambodia with Hellen Keller International to empower women. She also worked with Monitor Deloitte in corporate strategy and innovation consultancies. In addition, Maricel was named on the 2022 Forbes' 30 under 30 list.

In this episode, Maricel walks me through her career path leading up to Compound Foods, why coffee is so important to her, and the company's approach to beanless coffee. We also discuss the impacts of climate change in the coffee industry, the startup's most recent raise, and how sustainability has shaped Compound Foods. This is a great episode for those interested in the intersection of food and climate change.

Enjoy the show!

You can find me on twitter @jjacobs22 or @mcjpod and email at info@mcjcollective.com, where I encourage you to share your feedback on episodes and suggestions for future topics or guests.

Episode recorded February 23rd, 2022

To learn more about Compound Food, visit: https://www.compound-foods.com/

To learn more about this episode, visit: https://mcjcollective.com/my-climate-journey-podcast/compound-foods

Get connected with MCJ: 

• Jason Jacobs X / LinkedIn
• Cody Simms X / LinkedIn
• MCJ Podcast / Collective / YouTube

*If you liked this episode, please consider giving us a review! You can also reach us via email at content@mcjcollective.com, where we encourage you to share your feedback on episodes and suggestions for future topics or guests.

Today's guest is Patricia Bubner, Co-Founder & CEO of Orbillion Bio, Inc.

Patricia is a founder and the CEO of Orbillion Bio, Inc. The company is on a mission to accelerate the broad availability of a variety of healthy, nutritious, and flavorful cultivated meat products. Orbillion recently graduated from renowned Y Combinator's Winter 21 batch. Originally from Austria, Patricia is a scientist and engineer working to build a future of ethical and sustainable food. Before Orbillion, she co-founded an agriculture & food systems project, The Millet Project, that aimed at diversifying agriculture and our diet by cultivation and consumption of lesser-known grains such as millets. Patricia did her postdoc at the Energy Biosciences Institute at UC Berkeley, where she studied the expression of glycoproteins in filamentous fungi and plants.

In this episode, Patricia walks me through Orbillion Bio Inc, the company's origins, and how the ethics of traditional meat production motivated her to co-found the startup. We dive into the key phases of bringing the company to market and how to scale the cell-based meat industry. Patricia also explains the impact food systems have on the environment and why wide-scale adoption of alternative meats is essential for addressing climate change. Patricia is a fantastic guest!

Enjoy the show!

You can find me on twitter @jjacobs22 or @mcjpod and email at info@myclimatejourney.co, where I encourage you to share your feedback on episodes and suggestions for future topics or guests.

Episode recorded August 6th, 2021

To learn more about Orbillion Bio Inc., visit: https://www.orbillion.com/

To learn more about this episode, visit: https://myclimatejourney.co/ctss-episodes/orbillion

Get connected with MCJ: 

• Jason Jacobs X / LinkedIn
• Cody Simms X / LinkedIn
• MCJ Podcast / Collective / YouTube

*If you liked this episode, please consider giving us a review! You can also reach us via email at content@mcjcollective.com, where we encourage you to share your feedback on episodes and suggestions for future topics or guests.

Today's guest is Jasmine Crowe, Founder & CEO of Goodr Co.

Every year, 80 billion pounds of food is wasted in the US, just from consumer-facing businesses. Food waste is also a massive climate problem. When food is wasted, it ends up in landfills and starts emitting greenhouse gases. To tackle this problem, Jasmine founded Goodr, a sustainable food surplus management company leveraging technology to reduce food waste and feed the hungry. Prior to Goodr, Jasmine founded BlackCelebrityGiving.com, where she helped start over 1,400 non-profits. She also holds a BA in Mass Communications from North Carolina Central University and has given multiple TED talks about ending hunger. 

In this episode, Jasmine and I explore the adverse effects of food waste on hunger and the environment. Jasmine walks me through what motivated her to found Goodr, key phases and raises to date, and the company's future. We also dive into the barriers to distributing food, why food waste is ultimately a policy problem, and its climate impacts. It was great to sit down with Jasmine and learn more about Goodr.

Enjoy the show!

You can find me on twitter @jjacobs22 or @mcjpod and email at info@myclimatejourney.co, where I encourage you to share your feedback on episodes and suggestions for future topics or guests.

Episode recorded July 22nd, 2021

To learn more about Goodr, visit: https://www.goodr.co/

To learn more about this episode, visit: https://myclimatejourney.co/ctss-episodes/goodr

Get connected with MCJ: 

• Jason Jacobs X / LinkedIn
• Cody Simms X / LinkedIn
• MCJ Podcast / Collective / YouTube

*If you liked this episode, please consider giving us a review! You can also reach us via email at content@mcjcollective.com, where we encourage you to share your feedback on episodes and suggestions for future topics or guests.

Today's guest is Irving Fain, Founder & CEO of Bowery Farming.

Bowery Farming is a modern farming company building smart indoor farms located close to its cities. Its farms are powered by its proprietary farm operating system, BoweryOS, creating a simplified, agile food system focused on flavor, freshness, and safety.

Irving has a diverse background across varying industries. He started his career in investment banking on Wall Street, where he focused on private equity and helping companies raise late-stage capital. Leaving the financial sector, Irving served as Director of Digital Marketing & Content at iHeartMedia. After four years with iHeartMedia, he knew his real passion was in entrepreneurship. Irving co-founded CrowdTwist, an enterprise software company providing comprehensive omni-channel loyalty & analytics solutions for industry-leading brands. Irving switched his focus towards climate solutions with a nagging feeling that he wanted to solve complex and significant problems with broader societal implications. In 2014, he founded Bowery Farming and currently serves as CEO.

Irving is a great guest, and I felt a lot of similarities in our respective journeys. Irving guides me through his career path, why he's always felt a passion for entrepreneurship, and how Bowery Farming came about. He explains Bowery Farming's mission, the practice of indoor farming, and what sets Bowery Farming apart from its competition. We also discuss the broader agriculture landscape, where policy fits into the conversation, and the future of food. This is a fantastic episode for anyone interested in the future of farming.

You can find me on twitter @jjacobs22 or @mcjpod and email at info@myclimatejourney.co, where I encourage you to share your feedback on episodes and suggestions for future topics or guests.

Episode recorded April 9th, 2021

To learn more about this episode, visit: https://myclimatejourney.co/episodes/irving-fain

To learn more about Bowery Farming: https://boweryfarming.com/

Bowery Farming is hiring! Check out the available positions here: https://boweryfarming.com/careers/#section-job-listings

Get connected with MCJ: 

• Jason Jacobs X / LinkedIn
• Cody Simms X / LinkedIn
• MCJ Podcast / Collective / YouTube

*If you liked this episode, please consider giving us a review! You can also reach us via email at content@mcjcollective.com, where we encourage you to share your feedback on episodes and suggestions for future topics or guests.