Realfoodology - 'There's a Reason Cheap Food is Cheap' + How Food Ends Up On the Shelf | Kyle Koehler of Wildway

Episode Date: January 9, 2024

EP. 178: Join the conversation with Kyle Koehler, the visionary behind Wildway Foods, as we peel back the curtain on the true cost of cheap food and the monumental challenges those in the health-conscious food space face. Discover how spending less at the checkout may actually be costing us more in healthcare, and why it's essential to support companies that put our well-being at the forefront. From the meticulous processes of regenerative farming to the crafting of additive-free products, Kyle and I explore how every dollar spent is a vote for the future of our health and our planet. If you want to try Wildway, use code REALFOODOLOGY for 20% off at https://wildwayoflife.com Topics Discussed: 11:57 - Regenerative Farming Challenges and Sustainable Sourcing 19:04 - Challenges of Global Supply Chains 24:56 - Product Pricing and Additives 29:07 - Navigating the Food Industry and Choices 41:21 - Food Companies' Retail Challenges 59:29 - Concerns About Food Safety and Regulation 01:04:07 - Regenerative Farming and Health Priorities Sponsored By: ARMRA Colostrum Get 15% off your first order at tryarmra.com/realfoodology Natural Cycles for 15% off go to naturalcycles.com with code REALFOODOLOGY Honed Vitamins use code REALFOODOLOGY for 15% off at livehoned.com Organifi Code REALFOODOLOGY gets you 20% Off at www.organifi.com/realfoodology Open Guided Meditation Get 30 days free of Open by visiting withopen.com/REALFOODOLOGY Check Out Wildway: If you want to try Wildway, use code REALFOODOLOGY for 20% off at https://wildwayoflife.com Show Links: Kiss The Ground Common Ground Check Out Courtney: Check Out My new FREE Grocery Guide! @realfoodology www.realfoodology.com My Immune Supplement by 2x4 Air Dr Air Purifier AquaTru Water Filter EWG Tap Water Database  Produced By: Drake Peterson Edited & Mixed By: Mike Frey

On today's episode of The Real Foodology Podcast. USDA did a study of the percent of consumer spending that's spent on food. And out of the 104 countries that they surveyed, the United States was the lowest. We spend the lowest amount of consumer spending on food, yet we're consistently one of the countries with the highest amount spent per person on healthcare. We don't truly understand the true cost of food because we're paying for that on the back end. Hello, friends. Welcome back to another episode of The Real Foodology Podcast. Today's guest is Kyle Kohler of Wildway Foods. This was an absolutely fascinating episode.

I have been wanting to do an episode like this for a while because I really want you guys to understand from a consumer standpoint how really hard it is for these food companies that are trying to do best by us for our health. The companies that are putting health over profit are having to go through so many loopholes and do so much extra work and deal with so many more logistics than the brands that are just putting out the crappy processed food with all the additives and all the garbage in it that are doing it the way that our food industry is set up right now. And unfortunately, it's just the way that things are run right now. It's why I always say it is so incredibly important that we put our money into the brands that are doing right by us because the more that we demand this with our dollars,

the more that companies that are creating food are going to go, wow, consumers are spending so much money. Consumers spent X amount of money last year in the regenerative space, which is telling us that people really want this. So where we put our money is where trends are going to drive. If you're unfamiliar with Wildway, let's dive into them just a little bit. They are, from their website, building a healthier planet with better breakfast and snacks. They just introduced their planet-friendly oats, meaning that they're crafted from regenerative organic ingredients. Hopefully by now, you guys know how incredibly important regenerative farming is. We dive a little bit into it in this episode, but not too much because I've done so many episodes on that already. So if you're newer to the subject, I highly recommend going back and

listening to earlier episodes. I also recommend you checking out the documentaries, Kiss the Ground and Common Ground, because it explains in depth how regenerative farming gets us back to nature, how it pulls carbon from the atmosphere and brings it back into the soil. Carbon is food for the soil and it creates a healthier soil. It creates healthier food for us. So healthier humans. And then also it is so much better for the animals. I absolutely love what Wildway is doing.

Their oats are so freaking good. They come in a bunch of different flavors. They also have one that does not have any flavors or sweeteners. If you want just plain oats, that's the original one. And then they also have a maple coconut oats, that's the original one. And then they also have a maple coconut sugar, which is so freaking good. Raspberry chia and banana nut, but they are all really simple ingredients. Like let me read you the ingredients from the raspberry chia. There's no natural flavors in here. It's simply organic oats, coconut sugar, organic chia seeds, organic dried raspberries, and sea salt, and that is it.

It's beautiful. It's what you want an ingredient list to look like. It's real food. They also have their grain-free granola, which is so good. I love to put it on top of smoothies, on top of yogurt. It's also fun to put it on top of like a crumble, like use it as the crumble crust when you want to make like a peach crumble or something for dessert. They also have coconut chips and they have grain-free hot cereal. So I highly recommend checking them out. We have a link in the show notes if you guys want to check that out. So more about the episode, we really dive into the ins and outs of everything that goes on in the backend as far as food production goes. We talk about industrialized monocultural farming,

which is where a lot of these larger food brands are getting their foods from to create their food like products. We also talk about supply chains. We talk about industrialized manufacturing, distribution, retail exploitation, just all the hoops that these companies have to go through. And also too, it reveals so much of the corruption that's going on in our food industry right now that we need to clean up. And then we ended on a really high note with a lot of hope. So I just want you guys to know that it is not all doom and gloom, but we need to know that this is happening so that we know what to look out for. This is how we learn what brands we can support, what brands we want to support with our money so we can drive those consumer trends. I get asked all the time on my Instagram, how can we as the consumer be a part of the change? And this is how we be a part of the change. We educate ourselves on what the food industry looks like,

the ins and outs of it, what to look out for. And then we find those brands that are actually doing right by us and right by our health and the brands that are more concerned about the health and not the profit. So with that, let's dive into the episode. As always, if you guys could take a moment to rate and review the podcast, it means so much to me and it really, really helps the show. This is the only way that I can truly grow is if you share it and you leave a rating and review. So I appreciate your support so much. I just, I wish I could hug all of you guys listening. It means so much to me. I could never tell you how much it means. So thank you so much. Is it just me or is colostrum just totally taking the internet by storm? I mean, I'm so happy about it. And it's so interesting how certain things will just become a massive trend. I've been taking colostrum for probably at least 10 years now or so. My mom got me on it. It's an ancient practice used for immune function. It really helps to

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protection or abstain. So all you have to do is first thing in the morning, take your temperature either with a thermometer or if you have a wearable like an Oura Ring or an Apple Watch, it automatically connects to your app, but you do not need a wearable. You simply just need a thermometer and to take your temperature first thing in the morning. If you would like to try Natural Cycles, go to naturalcycles.com, use code realfoodology, and you're going to get 15% off an annual subscription plus a free thermometer. Again, that's naturalcycles.com, code realfoodology. This is an ad, and Natural Cycles is for 18 plus and does not protect against STIs. Kyle, I'm so excited to have you on today. I'm so excited to dive into what I really want to talk about because I want so excited to have you on today. I'm so excited to dive into what I really want to

talk about because I want my listeners to understand is the business side of running a business when you're trying to do it the right way. There's a lot of people we're demanding better from our food system. We're wanting better food. We're wanting higher quality. But then there's this disconnect of the brands that are really trying to do it the right way. The way that the system is set up right now, and I want people to understand the corruption and the way that the system is set up, it is making it a really uphill battle. It is very hard for these brands to do right by people's health. And I don't say that to discourage people. We're obviously going to give them a lot of hope. But anyways, I just want people really to understand

how amazing it is that a company like yours, like Wildway, is actually doing this because it really is hard and I want to commend you guys for that. So thank you so much for coming on and I'm very excited to have you here. Yeah, yeah, thank you. I'm incredibly grateful to be on the show

and talk about it. It's something close to my heart as well because it's tough. It's very tough as a small and medium-sized as a manufacturing food brand it's tough to to do things the right way because everything pushes you um to do it the wrong way right and we're fighting it from both sides not only from the supply side um ingredient wise and from farmers and growers and and that side but also from the distribution and retail side which i know you know a lot of the challenges to getting a product through distribution onto retail. So as a manufacturer

and a brand, all of us are kind of stuck in the middle, fighting it from both sides. And all the cost considerations and everything from both sides makes it incredibly tough to really just even survive in the business. So yeah, it's certainly a challenge. Yeah. Well, like I said, I really want to commend you guys for doing the right thing. I pulled this from, I think it was from your website. Your mission basically is we're building a food system that goes beyond sustainable, connecting climate, health to human health through resilient, equitable, and regenerative business, which is so amazing. How did you get into all of this? How did you start Wildway? So we're an 11-year-old company. So we celebrated our 11th year last month. And so we kind of

started years ago. I took a lot of things out of my diet. I did this... Well, I did this program... At the time, it was called The Whole Nine. So right now, it's more popularly known as The Whole 30. Oh, I've never heard that. Yeah. So at the time, before it was the whole 30, it was the whole nine. And they had a book. And so I took all these things out of my diet and did some elimination diet. Couldn't find anything to eat, right? Nothing. That's what really kind of opened my eyes to, man, most food is not made from real food. This is crazy. So I really tried to, at the time, tried to recreate a Larbar, really, because it was one one of the only things on the market that was like just made with real food, right? Just fruit and nuts. And that was it.

Ended up kind of crumbling. It didn't do very well, but it kind of ate like this granola concoction or snack and kind of made it for myself for a while. And at the time I was in the accounting and finance world, so I was working a lot of hours, eating a lot of takeout, eating at my desk, doing that whole thing, and just not living a very healthy lifestyle at all. And really wanted to do something that I felt more passionate about, that fit more my lifestyle. And so I decided to just upend everything and quit that and move back to Texas, where I was from, and chose San Antonio because I had family here in San Antonio and had this concoction, this thing that I'd been myself for a while. And I said, well, let's see if this is something that can sell. And so I took it to farmer's markets here in San Antonio and did really well. We sold out within an hour or first two farmer's markets. And you're from

San Antonio, so you know that San Antonio is not the epitome of health at all. I would say it's the mecca of the opposite. Yeah, yeah. A whole lot of things like Rico's cheese, right? And so I said, hey, if this can do well at the farmer's market too, then I think we might have something that can scale and do well. And so I walked into Whole Foods offices one day and just said, hey, I have a product that I think you guys would enjoy and really like. And one thing led to another.

We got on shelves at Whole Foods and soon HEB and some other retailers and things just kind of took off from there. So, yeah. Well, your brand has a special place in my heart because you're in San Antonio. I grew up there. I went to high school there. I was born there. My dad was born there, like third generation San Antonio, Texas boy.

So I love to hear that. That's so cool. And especially too, So I love to hear that. That's so cool. And especially too, it's cool to hear because a lot of these brands are based out of LA or where they're really in the health Mecca. And so it's cool to see other people branching out because Lord knows San Antonio needs the help. It's true. It's true. Yeah. So, okay. So I want to start kind of breaking this down because I want people, like I said, to really understand. So, where do you want to start first? Yeah. I mean, we can start from the farming side. 60% of the food that's grown in the US

is grown on monoculture industrialized farms and the food goes to animal feed and ethanol. Like it's crazy, right? That over half of the food produced in this country, like we don't even eat. It's animal feed and it goes to ethanol production like that's wild um and you know and 60 of it and it's destroying the land right those farming methods are just destroying the planet and destroying our soil so something has to be done there um and and so that's that's definitely a good place to start and a good and a good place of what we're trying to do in the direction we're trying to take the business and supporting regenerative agriculture and so i know that that you've talked with Gabe Brown, you've talked with Jordan, you've talked to some of these guys that are really behind a lot of the regenerative

movement and some things that they're doing. And so it's important for people to know, right, that the reason why a lot of their food is so cheap is because a lot of those, it comes from a lot of those industrialized monoculture crops that are subsidized by the government, right? And so... That are coming from our tax dollars, by the way. I like to remind people of that, that the food is not actually that cheap. We're just paying for it on the back end here, and we don't even get a choice on the health of it. It's crazy. Yeah. And so, you know, the United States, I think the USDA did a study of the percent of consumer spending that's spent on food. And out of the 104 countries that they surveyed, the United States was the lowest.

We spend the lowest amount of consumer spending on food, yet we're consistently one of the countries with the highest amount spent per person on health care. There's a correlation there for sure, right? We spend the lowest amount of our consumer spending on food, but the highest amount on health care, right? So we're paying for it. We're paying for it on the back end, right? And the true cost of food, we don't truly understand the true cost of food because we're paying for that on the back end

for sure. Yeah. And then we're also paying for it in our health and our energy. Yeah. I mean, we're really paying for it in many ways. And then not to mention too, with this industrialized monoculture farming, where you said the majority of our farming practices is this monoculture farming, it's absolutely destroying our land. And as a result, it's one of the driving factors of climate change, which I don't think people fully understand. We hear like, oh, cows farting, whatever. I'm like, that is nothing compared to the destructive nature that we're doing with spraying everything with pesticides. We're uprooting the top soil. We're not going to have soil left to plant in. I mean, this is a really big deal that no one's really

talking about on a large scale. Yeah, it's crazy. I mean, almost a third of greenhouse gas emissions globally come from food production, right? A third, right? It's not coming from, you know, it's not oil, petroleum, all the things that you can talk about, right? But food production, right? A third, right? It's not coming from, you know, it's not oil, petroleum, all the things that you can talk about, right? But food production is almost a third of it. It's crazy. So yeah, it's things that not a lot of people are talking about. But like you said, we're paying for it on both sides.

We're paying to destroy our own planet that we're living on, which is crazy to think about, right? It's crazy. It's a food system that's very backwards, yeah. Yeah, and then as a result, we're paying for it with our health. Also, so many people, myself included, are so concerned about the welfare of animals.

And all of this could be resolved if we went back to nature, which is going back to regenerative farming, which is working with nature, working with the animals. It would improve all of this. Yes, yeah, yeah. And it goes back to becoming really hard to do

as a brand new manufacturer, right? Because it's so nascent right now, it's so new. Less than 1% of farmland in the United States are using these methods, right? And so as we're trying to source ingredients and uproot our supply chain and change it to take on farmers and growers that are using these methods, we're really limited,

not only in supply, but in the farmers and growers that we partner with. And so what that does to us as a brand and manufacturer just adds an immense amount of not only cost, but also risk, right? Because if there's, you know, we go from having two or three or four different, you know, farmers or suppliers to having one, all right? And if so, something happens to that one farmer's crop or that one crop rotation or whatever they're doing, you know, we don't have a product to sell. You know, I have to go back to retailers and say, hey, I don't have anything for a year because my one supplier that I'm using, who's doing these, who's doing things the right way, you know, weather happened, right. Or something outside of our control happened and, and, and it could, it, it could end our end our business. And so it's those risks

that we're having to kind of hedge and take on as we try to move this direction. But it's worth it because if not now, then when? When are we going to try to make this change? And so it becomes tough. It becomes really tough on the supply side. And so we've changed our supply model a lot to work direct with a lot of farmers and growers. And our supply chain has really gotten global as well. As we've tried to look for people that are doing things the right way, we've had to look outside the United States. And so we're sourcing things from all over the place, which again, it's not ideal, right? I would much rather source everything here domestically. In order to find people that are doing things the right way, it's increasingly difficult. Yeah. So I'm curious, what does that look like when you compare U.S. to

other countries? Like, are there more people doing it better outside of the U.S.? Because I know a lot of people say like, oh, Europe has it all figured out or, you know, these other countries have it all figured out. What does that look like from a distributor or from you trying to find these suppliers standpoint? Yeah, I think a lot of it too is crop dependent, right? And so a lot of it depends on where a lot of the crops are grown and the things that we're using. So a lot of our core products, they use a lot of nuts and dried fruit and tropical fruit, right? And so a lot of things that just aren't grown in the United States either. So we're talking coconut and bananas and pineapples, things like that, that we have to go source globally. And a lot of those supply chains, you know, if you really look into the supply chain of

things like coconut and tropical fruits and things, you know, equally really broken, right? Equally really broken food systems. You know, you've got people that are deforesting land in these areas of the countries to plant palm trees or whatever it may be, right? And doing it with horrible labor practices. And so, you know, we have to really work to find people that are doing things the right be, right? And doing it with horrible labor practices. And so, you know, we have to really work to find people that are doing things the right way, right? And regenerative and regenerative organic specifically

really is a great validation step for us and a great verification step for us to ensuring that a lot of those people are doing things the right way. And so we've really kind of doubled down on regenerative organic certification and using the ROA, the regenerative organic alliance to really verify a lot of these things. It was an alliance that was formed by Patagonia and Dr. Broners and a lot of great people in the industry that have done some really great things

on the supply side. And so they've kind of pioneered this movement to help people globally do things the right way. And so they've really helped that organization and certifications really helped us out a lot, sourcing these things from people that are working on fixing a food system, not just domestically, but globally in ways that's also incredibly broken. Wow. That gives me a lot of hope. That's awesome. It's cool to hear that globally people are starting to pay attention to this and it's becoming a thing that everyone's really trying to all come together to fix. Because ultimately at the end of the day, what we do here in the US is still going to affect the planet and vice versa globally. So

this really needs to be a global movement that happens. Yeah, I agree. I agree. Yeah. So let's talk about exploitative supply chains. Because I know this is another one like with middlemen and labor practices. I know a little bit about this and it's one of the many reasons I encourage people to buy higher quality, buy organic, because we don't think about the people actually on the farms being exposed to these really horrible, toxic pesticides, synthetic fertilizers,

and how it's affecting their health. You know, this is also a human rights issue. Yeah, yeah. There's a lot of really broken supply chains out there. And it really stems from the company's drive to do things faster, easier, cheaper, right? Any way that they can do things faster, easier, and cheaper, they're going to take the shortcuts, right? And so, you know, that's one of the reasons why we strictly only source things globally

from regenerative organic certified farmers, because regenerative organic certification takes organic as a baseline, right? The baseline, you have to be organic, and then it adds on animal welfare and farmer welfare as well. So it takes into account ethics and farmer welfare, how they're treating their people and how they're treating the stakeholders in their supply chain. And so that we know that those supply chains are doing things ethically and aren't doing things the wrong way, right? And so it becomes incredibly important, especially in areas like Asia and South America and Latin America. There's a lot of really broken supply chains around a lot of these crops, but there are a lot of really good suppliers out there that are doing things the right way, working with NGOs and creating co-ops that are bringing smallholder farmers together to really create a difference. And so you can find them out there.

And so those are the people that we choose to support. That's amazing. I actually recently watched a new documentary from the makers of Kiss the Ground. Maybe you've seen it called Common Ground. Have you heard of this yet? Yeah, yeah. Oh, it is such a good documentary.

I can't like talk about it enough right now. I'm just like, everyone needs to go see it. It's so important. And this is one of the things that they're trying to raise awareness around is that a lot of these workers that are picking our food, like picking blueberries, for example, they are handpicking all of these. And a lot of them are either illegal immigrants or people getting really, really low wages. They're being exposed to these toxic chemicals, like I said, really not being treated well at all because essentially they're seen as disposable because they feel like they can get away with it because they're illegal. And so

these people are considered to be more desperate. And I don't think enough people are thinking about that. I think we're so disconnected from our food right now. And part of my mission is to try to remind people that there's this larger thing happening and we're so disconnected from our food that we need to start thinking about these important things and really where we're putting our money because where we're putting our money is where we are either supporting those practices

or we're supporting companies like your brand that are actually going out of their way and making sure that you're not paying like slave labor. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's, you know, there's a reason why cheap food is cheap, right? There's a reason why it's priced the way it is. And so inherently, a lot of those things, you know, that the food system is broken, the supply chain is broken, right? If people are paying fair wages to their workers and to their farmers, that's going to be reflected in the crop and it's going to be reflected in the product that the end consumer gets in the grocery store, right? And so it's – price really will tell a lot. Price will tell a lot. It will. a lot um it will and so you know and and there's a lot of aggregators out there on supply chain a lot of importers and aggregators that that that again their goals is to make things faster easier

cheaper right the more they can aggregate the the the cheaper they can get it the cheaper they can sell it the more profit they can make um and so that's why we've worked really really hard to work direct with the farmers and the growers where we can as much as possible because we know that like this isn't going to be shipped to some middleman that's going to be shipped to another middleman that's being shipped to another middleman, it's going to be shipped to another middleman, that's being shipped to another middleman, but then by the time it gets to us, you know, God knows who's touched it.

And then at the same time, it's a lot more expensive, parked on the shelves a lot more expensive. And so that's the way that, because accessibility is really important to us as well. We want our products to be accessible to a large consumer. I mean, I grew up in a really middle, lower middle-class like household, right? My mother was a teacher, my dad worked at a power plant right it you know we have to make our

products accessible to people that really need them and so that's always been been incredibly important to us and how we price our products and so one way in which we can do that is is cutting out a lot of those middlemen that are just going to increase our price and working direct with all the farmers and growers where we can and importing those things directly ourselves it's more risk and it's a little bit more of a challenge and logistically it's a lot more complicated logistically um working with you know instead of working with one you know aggregator a big importer and ordering all of our ingredients from one location you know we've got a dozen different ingredients that are coming from a dozen different places and a dozen different farms that makes it makes it logistically a lot more challenging

um but we know that it's being done the right way. It's being grown the right way. No one's being exploited. And at the same time, we can offer a product to consumers at a price point that's a lot more accessible. So it makes a lot more sense. Yeah, it's amazing. And it's, I'm sure, fascinating for people to hear just how much harder it is. All the loopholes that you guys have to go through, all the logistics of just trying to create a healthier for you product. It really is a lot of work. So, you know, we've brought up this notion of like bigger, cheaper, faster. And I was thinking about how, so there's this trend that I've started seeing on Instagram recently of people starting to call out. They're like, I don't understand why a product that has

37 ingredients is so much cheaper than a product that has like one or two ingredients. Can we talk people through this? Like what is happening there? Yeah. Yeah. It's crazy. That's crazy. Right? I mean, so many of those ingredients, they're not real food, right? They're additives. They exist to make that food taste better, be easier to digest, right? Be more flavorful. Maybe it's in there to make it look a certain way, right? That's why we have all these dyes and different things or emulsifiers and all of these crazy things, these guar gums and these, you know, all of these things that you'd never be able to go out and find in the wild, right? They're to make food more palatable and they'll be able to make sell more of it right um you know we've we've

you know we were a part of an incubator program um at one point in time with a large company we're talking to them about some of their formulations and how they formulate products and and you know they essentially straight up admitted you know to us you know for lack of a better word that that they make they formulate their products to make people want to eat more of them. They want people to finish the whole bag at one sitting because then they have to go back and buy it again. They specifically formulate the flavor, the taste. They have people that sit around all day that work on how much a chip crunches so that they can get the exact perfect crunch of the chip and the flavor and the spice so that someone ends up

sitting down and eating the entire bag, and guess what? They're still hungry after that because it doesn't contain any nutritive value at all. Right? So you have a lot of big companies that have whole teams that sit around and figure out how can we make this, someone sit down and eat this entire product in one sitting

so they'll have to go to the store and buy it again and again and again. It's crazy. It's just wild, again. It's crazy. It's just wild, right? It's crazy. Did you know that your nervous system plays a role in nearly every aspect of your health and wellbeing? No matter what you eat, how much you exercise,

how skinny or young or strong you are, none of it matters if you are not breathing properly. This is actually a quote from James Nestor, the author of the book, Breath. And I will tell you guys, this is something that I have realized in my own life. When I'm really anxious, I don't take full deep breaths. I take these really shallow breaths. And as a result, it only creates more anxiety. So really becoming aware of your breath and practicing breath work is the quickest way to

shift your state and improve your mood. And you only need five minutes a day. I will tell you guys, this is something that felt super daunting to me and I ignored it for a long time because I just thought, okay, this is too much for me. It's gonna take too much time and it probably doesn't really work. But after downloading the app Open

and using some of their breathwork classes and going through some of the meditations, I have to tell you that it is completely life-changing. Open is a science-based practice to help regulate your nervous system, and it really does change your life. If you're a beginner, the app is really great because it helps you to learn different breathwork techniques to help you get to your desired physical and mental state. Also, if you're not a beginner, it's also just a great app to keep you accountable day to day. When we regain control of our operating system, we can unlock deeper sleep, better focus,

less stress, natural energy, and overall vibrancy. I mean, it's truly life-changing. Where are my Andrew Huberman fans? I know there are a lot of you guys out there. He found that brief, brief meaning like five minutes of breath work, outperformed meditation for improving mood and autonomic regulation and lowering stress. So if you want to reduce stress, get better focus, get better sleep, and you want to get on my daily routine, you can get 30 days free of Open by visiting withopen.com slash realfoodology. Again, that is 30 days free by just simply visiting withopen.com slash realfoodology. That's W-I-T-H-O-P-E-N.com.

I have been consuming collagen for about six years now. I like to put it in my morning drink, whether that's coffee or matcha. I usually prefer coffee, but lately I've actually been doing coffee and then having a matcha a little bit later. I love to mix the collagen in with my nut milk that I put in my coffee. It's usually almond milk or coconut milk. And I'm so excited to announce that Organifi has their own collagen now. As with all Organifi products, it's glyphosate residue free, really high quality. It has hydrolyzed

bovine hide collagen peptides that are derived from pasture raised cows. It also has eggshell membrane collagen. It's taken from the thin layer between the egg and the shell. And this is collagen rich, and it may be beneficial for strong joint health. It also has hydrolyzed fish collagen peptides derived from wild caught fish. Because this collagen source is of a small particle size, it makes it easier to digest and more absorbable. And then there's also chicken bone broth protein concentrate in there. This collagen type is actually found in your gut joints and cartilage, and it helps support greater health both inside and out. Collagen is really good for lubricating the joints. It's also great for healing and sealing the gut. Often now

because of our diets, people are dealing with leaky gut syndrome and collagen actually goes in there and helps to seal the gut. So if you're having any sort of leaky gut syndrome symptoms, collagen may be your best bet. It's also great for just replenishing collagen stores that diminish as we age and may help with wrinkles and keeping supple skin because collagen also is what keeps our skin elastic. So this is why I consume collagen. I love Organifi. I love all of their products. If you guys want to try any of the Organifi products for 20% off, you can use code realfoodology or go to Organifi.com slash realfoodology. That's O-R-G-A-N-I-F-I.com slash realfoodology. It makes me so mad.

I've actually, I've brought up that point before, but I had never actually heard someone like actually admitting it, like a company admitting that they do that. But we know they do this because, you know, like Doritos, for example, they have a full staff of people called food scientists that their entire job is to make this product hit that bliss point. Well, that bliss point means that you're going to make someone addicted to it. It fires all the neurons on your brain, you know, in your brain that similar neurons that flare off when you're eating or when you're taking drugs. It has a similar effect on our brains. And what makes me so mad about this is there is a deception happening that so many people are offline to. There are so many people

that do not even understand that they are addicted to these foods. And they are a part of this system that is not designed to provide any sort of nutrients or health value for them. And they think that they're getting food and they're not. They're not eating real food. And they're, I don't want to say this, but kind of a victim of this like addiction cycle of like, okay, I just finished this whole bag of chips. Now I need to buy another one. And oh my God, it just makes me so mad. Yeah, it's crazy. I mean, and it's, you know, it's, again, it's on the consumer side too, you know, consumers want their shopping experience to be faster, easier and cheaper as well. Right. They don't want to take, they don't want to take the

time. I mean, I geek out in the grocery store, right? I'm sure you do too. Like I love going and like taking the, you know, looking at the ingredients and what it's from and all, you know, I can spend hours. Right. But most consumers don't, right. They do, you know, looking at the ingredients and what it's from and all, you know, I could spend hours, right. But most consumers don't, right. They do, you know, I call it like when you doom scroll on your phone through social media, right. I call it doom shopping, right. Where they just go and they just like grab whatever they, you know, normally get without

or just, or, or they, they rely on just marketing, right. Scheme to like figure out what to eat. And it's crazy, right. I was in, this was a few years ago i was in a costco shopping and it was over listen you know hearing a couple talk about so so excited they were doing the keto diet they had a friend do it and they lost a lot of weight and they were super excited about to do the keto diet you know i look in their cart and it's just like keto oreos keto chocolate you know snack makes keto and like there wasn't a single meat or vegetable in their entire crowd i was like

oh my god like oh my gosh right it's just just, it's that culture of like this convenience that like, instead of actually looking at what these things are made of, they just see this, you know, this dietary buzzword, like that's, it's got to be good for me or it fits what I need to fit. And I'm going to buy it without actually taking the time to like sit there and look at like, what's actually in, what's actually in this product, right? You know, to see that it's got more erythritol than it does cacao right or something exactly it's wild yeah it's wild well and it's you know it comes down to something as simple as we are living beings and those foods and boxes are are dead foods we want to be as living beings eating living foods because these are life-giving, life-sustaining. And I say this all the time,

I'm a realist in the modern world. I'm not saying like, go live on a farm, pick your own berries and eat apples from the tree. Like that's not sustainable for 98% of us. But what I am saying is that like, we need to start really paying attention to the ingredients that are in these foods and start buying these packaged foods when we need them to fill in the gaps and look for the products like yours that are actually taking the care to create a quality

food that's made from real food ingredients that you recognize. And that's what I love so much about Wildway is I look at the back of the ingredients and I'm like, oh my gosh, I could literally buy every single one of these ingredients here right here at the grocery store and make this if I wanted to. But thank God I don't have to because I don't have time. I'm busy, you know? And so there has to be that like middle ground. And where do we reach those people that, how do we reach those people that are, yeah, like buying the keto stuff and just filling their cart with a bunch of boxes thinking that they're eating food? Yeah. Yeah. Well, you Well, it has to get buying from the entire system, right? And so it's crazy because we've been approached in the past by a lot of retailers. And what they'll say is, hey,

do you have any new keto stuff that you can make for us? They're focused on the same things, right? What do you have that's keto? What do you have that you can say that's no sugar added? Or what do you have? They're focused on the same dietary outcomes because their consumers are, right? And so that's what they're focused on bringing in. So if we hadn't buy-in from some of these retailers and said, hey, we, you know, we realize that this is a growing movement, but let's maybe focus on some real food ingredient things. So let's focus on, let's give priority to products made using regenerative practices, right? Or products that come from smallholder farmers. Let's make that a priority for our customers

because then it can become its own self-fulfilling prophecy, right? Customers start to see these things over and over again and they go, oh, okay, well now I'm not seeing keto all over the shelf. I'm seeing regenerative all over the shelf. Like this must be what I need to be eating. Like this must be the new thing.

Like it can be its own self-fulfilling prophecy, but we have to have buy-in from the powers that be really, from a lot of the gatekeepers and the retailers and the distributors that whose job it is to get these things on their shelves and in front of consumers. 100%, and we also need, we need the population as a whole demand better.

I know someone who was in the hospital pretty recently and they called me and they were like, you would be absolutely horrified by the me and they were like, you would be absolutely horrified by the food that they're trying, like quote unquote food that they're trying to serve me. And they said that they asked one of the registered dietitians, they were like, what is your thinking behind this? Like you are a nutritional professional that went to school to learn how to feed people healthier, nourishing foods. And then here I am in the hospital and you're serving me Jell-O and packaged products that

are loaded with sugar. You're handing me a soda, a Coca-Cola, when you know that diabetes is skyrocketing in this country. And you know what the registered dietician's response was? Was, well, you know what? People eat like this at home and we know that they're gonna want their comfort foods in the hospital. So we can't really control it. Like they're demanding it and they're asking for it anyways.

So we might as well feed them what they want. And I was horrified by that response because what makes me so mad about that is now we're making up excuses for people. Many times people don't understand or even know that the choices that they're making are as detrimental for their health as they are. So a lot of this starts with education. So while yes, people are demanding these quick fast foods, they are demanding these like, you know, highly palatable, highly caloric, like high sugar bombs,

basically. At the same time, they don't know any different. They don't know that the harming effects that it's truly having on their body, like they're hearing a little bit, but I don't think people are really fully understanding. And also if we are giving them better options, they're going to be so much happier. We're not really helping people understand that like eating whole real food actually tastes amazing. And when you start feeling better in your body, it's all you want and all you demand. Yeah. Yeah. It's, you know, it goes back to, you don't know how much better you'll feel until you start feeling better. And then you go, oh my gosh, I didn't realize I could feel this way. Right. Because you're so used to feeling a certain way. You're so used to feeling crappy and feeling

tired and lethargic. You just think that that's, this is the way it is. Right. This is just how everyone feels. This must be how everybody feels. And that's just just think that this is the way it is, right? This is just how everyone feels. This must be how everybody feels. And that's just not the case, right? Yeah. Yeah, so it makes me so mad when it comes from the, it's like this messaging I feel like that's trickling down from big food.

And they're telling people like doctors and registered dieticians to just tell people like, this is fine. Like you can eat some processed food. Like it's actually an eating disorder to avoid processed foods and to eat all whole real foods. Like they're calling it an eating disorder. And then they're also telling them to tell their patients like, or they're telling them to approach their patients in a way where they're like, they're going to eat it anyways. So you might as well just let them eat it. And it's like, why are we not encouraging people to eat better?

Well, it's another reason why it makes it hard for companies like us to infiltrate those systems because those large companies have contracts with a lot of those places, right? So I could go in and to a hospital system or to a system like that and say, hey, I would love for you to sell our products. Oh, well, sorry, we have an exclusive with Frito-Lay. With Cisco or- Like, yeah, or either you're on the distributor side or on the brand side and say, hey, we can't

because we have this exclusive with these other guys, and they can pay for that exclusivity and we can't, right? And so it just adds another gate to the system of where we kind of get shut out because we don't have the deep pockets to do it. And those large companies do. So it's tough. Oh, this makes me so mad. And this actually dives into distribution, which is another huge one that I wanted to talk about. So there's those contracts. And then also this was something that I learned more recently through a friend of mine who has a small food company as well. Let's tell people a little bit about, my friend was calling it the grocery mafia, basically saying that in order to even be on a

shelf, you have to pay, maybe if you just want to walk people through it, basically you have to pay like a broker and then you have to pay the grocery store. So let's talk about that. Yeah. Yeah. And so in order to get a product and we'll call it a national natural food store, we'll just leave it at that. In order to get a product in a national natural food store, you've got to get it to a specific broker or save a specific deal with a specific broker. You've got to pay that broker a whole number of fees up front, thousands of dollars in fees up front just to get the broker to agree to take your product to then get it to the retailer. And then once it gets to the retailer, a lot of retailers

will require what's called free fills or and or sliding fees. So a free fill just means that you fill their shelves for every store. You fill the shelf full of products for free. You don't get paid for it. So I have to give every store one or two cases of product for free without without getting paid for it. And then a lot of times some stores will require sliding fees on top of that.

So on top of the free product, now I also have to pay 10, 20, 30, sometimes 50 to $100,000 just to have the opportunity to get my product on the shelf, right? This doesn't guarantee me like good shelf space. I can still be on the bottom. I can still be on the top.

This doesn't guarantee me great placement. It just guarantees me an opportunity to be on the shelf. It doesn't guarantee me even time on the shelf. A lot of times it doesn't guarantee me six months or a year. There's no time. A lot of times stores won't give you any time guarantee. Won't give you any placement guarantee. It's just a required fee up front. Right. And so companies like ours that do self-manufacturing and work directly with all of these farmers, you know, we've paid for those ingredients months ago, right? And so not only are we not going to get paid for our first shipment to a new retailer, but we've got fees on top of that. Fees on top of fees on top of fees.

And so it makes – it's an enormous cash outlay for a company like ours just to get into a retailer, just to get onto a retailer shelf, right? And then, you know, on the distributor side, you know, we're locked into these distributor contracts in which then you know on the distributor side you know you were locked into these distributor contracts in which you know distributor buys product from us but distributor has no liability if the distributor over orders product and something expires guess what the main fact i'm it's on us we're paying for it even though they over ordered and it's their fault i'm still paying for it if the distributor under orders and product doesn't get on shelf we get charged fees right and so product doesn't get on shelf, we get charged fees, right? And so there's all kinds of fees that we get charged from the distribution side.

All those costs come back to us. In order to promote in stores, in order to get our product noticed in stores, it costs quite a bit of money. And so- Meaning like being on like the end cap or something? I mean, not even on the end cap, right? And so in order to,

and most stores have gone to this model now, in order to simply run a sale, we have to pay an upfront fee of thousands of dollars in order just to run a sale. So in order for me to help the retailer sell my product, I have to pay a fee. I call it $2,000, $3,000 fee per time I run a sale. Just to have the ability to put my product on sale. And then when it becomes on sale, some retailers will cut in, pay in some of that sale. A lot of them now have gone to a model where

they don't even pay a portion of that sale at all. So if my product is a dollar off, not only am I paying for the dollar off, but a lot of times there's a fee, an additional fee per every coupon redemption. So that dollar off might actually cost me like $1.25 or $1.50 on top of that because of the additional fees that get charged to it. And so, and yeah, and you mentioned too, yeah, in order to get my product on a side cap or an end cap to really get noticed, I mean, that's a potential six figure payment just to get my product on an end cap or side cap to get noticed by shoppers. And so a lot of that stuff just becomes really out of reach unless you do it at a really small scale. And there's certain retailers now that won't let you do it at a

small scale, right? They say, hey, you got to do this nationally in all of our stores, or are you going to do it in none of our stores? And so I said, well, I can't, I don't have a quarter of a million dollars just for your store loans to put my product on end caps to get it noticed. And so, the distributor and retailer mafia is a really good way to put it because you have to be prepared to spend a lot of money. And that also plays into why products are so expensive on shelf, right? And so, from a typical distributor to retailer model, from what it costs us to make the product in-house here at the manufacturer, you can probably triple or quadruple that to what the product is going to be on the shelf.

So if you're seeing a product on shelf for, say, $10 on the manufacturing side, it's probably costing the manufacturer somewhere around $3 to actually make it, right? It gets marked up that much to get to the customer which is which is why not all stores are like that right there's some stores that have a more direct model costco is one of them um right trader joe's has a little more of a direct model they have a different model for the for their stores but the majority of traditional broker to retail stores the market that it takes the product to get to shelves it's going to 3 or 4x the cost that that that brand is making it for um which is crazy it makes a lot of products inaccessible right it's it, it's going to 3 or 4x the cost that that brand is making it for.

Which is crazy. It makes a lot of products inaccessible, right? It's a wild system. Yeah. That's crazy. I mean, that system should be illegal because at that point, how is any food company doing okay unless if they're freaking General Mills or Frito-Lay when they have millions to just do the end caps? And it also makes a lot of sense why every time you go to the grocery store, all the end caps are all the crap. Yeah, it's the companies that can afford to pay it, right? And so it becomes really hard for smaller companies like ours to break in without outside investment, right? Without institutional capital.

So what a lot of companies end up doing is they end up getting institutional capital from outside investors in order to grow. But then at some point, what do those investors want? They eventually want their return. So they want to find ways to make the product cheaper and easier and more scalable, right? So you get that investor money and all of a sudden, like you have to make a product that can go into Walmart, right? That can sell to a Walmart customer. So what you have to either make the ingredients cheaper or you have to cut corners some way, right, in order to make that product scale as fast as it can scale. So that becomes a double-edged sword, right?

So you either say, we're not going to take that capital, we're going to grow how we want to grow, or we're going to take risks and try to find capital and kind of lose some control over our business and our products and hope that the integrity stays there throughout the course of time. So it's tough. Wow, this also makes me never want to use a coupon again for a brand I love. that the integrity stays there throughout the course of time. So it's tough. Wow, this also makes me never want to use a coupon again for a brand I love. I just want to be like, I'm giving you my full dollars for this because I need to support you

in the grocery store. It's really wild. I mean, why is it set up that way? Is it so that, I mean, obviously it's so the grocery stores can make a profit, but why is it so skewed in one direction

with the grocery stores? It's like, but why is it so skewed in one direction with the grocery stores? It almost feels like the brands have no chance. It used to not be that way. It used to not be that way. And this is, I mean, even before we even started decades ago, it used to not be such a play-to-pay model. It used to not be that scheme. And so I think we started to see a lot of things really shift 10 to 15 years ago when venture capital money started being poured into the food and beverage space. So there was a lot

of, you know, traditionally a lot of that venture capital was in tech, right? Healthcare, finance, other things. And a lot of that money started pouring into food and beverage companies. So you had a lot of companies that all of a sudden had a lot of money behind them that they could spend. And then distributors and retailers all of a sudden said, oh, hey, like, we want a piece of all that money, right? You can afford to pay $10,000 per product to get it on the shelf. Like you can afford to pay us $100,000 to be on the end cap because you just got, you know, a million dollars from investors. And so there was a lot of really easy, cheap money that flowed into the food system over the past decade. That's changed a lot over the past couple of years and since COVID. But the 10 years pre-2020, just so much venture capital money flowed into food and

beverage companies because it was seen as a good investment. It was seen as stable, right? Everybody has to eat, right? And so because of that influx of cheap venture money and venture capital money bought to the tune of like hundreds of millions of dollars, that changed the industry a lot and really made it largely pay to play. So that's been part of it. And the other part of it, I think, is the consolidation of a lot of things, right? Amazon purchased Whole Foods. And so Whole Foods went from this very regional, locally focused model to a very kind of conglomerated national model now. And a lot of things have changed with retailers like that over the years as, as, because it's been a tough environment for natural retailers as well.

And so we've seen a lot of consolidation with natural retailers and then grocers in the space and, and they've just gotten bigger, right. And focused a lot more on cost and price. And they figured out like, Hey, you know, they figured out that they can charge for these things right because there's thousands of new foods come food companies pop up every single year and so they say man there's three thousand new food companies that popped up this year if I can get ten thousand dollars from every single one of them to as my sliding fee to put on the shelf like they're sitting there counting you know

counting the the extra money that they're making right and so it's the system kind of feeds on itself, right? And it's, you know, we're seeing a little bit of pushback from that now from companies, you know, like us and companies that are doing things better that are just saying like, you know, we've just said like, I'm not going to pay it. Like, I'm sorry.

Like that, that's not a win-win for me. Like, it's just not a win for you and it's not a win for me, right? Because I could pay you $10,000, $20,000 to get on the shelf and you can take me off in three months and I'm just SLL, right? And I'm left holding the bag, right? And not only am I left holding the bag, but all the farmers and suppliers that are also doing things the right way down the line, they get hurt as well, right? And so I think that's something that's definitely not taken into account at the retail and distributor level, that those things that

they're doing and the cost that they're making these brands pay, it's just trickling down the line, especially with the brands that are doing the right thing on the supply side. Did you know that blindly taking supplements can end up doing more harm than good? You need to understand what's going on in your body first before you start supplementing. I'm a huge proponent for mineral and vitamin testing so that you know exactly what's going on in your body, what mineral and vitamin deficiencies you have. And then from there, you can decide what vitamins and minerals your body actually needs. I love honed vitamins. They use hair tissue mineral analysis, which is a foundational tool in functional medicine to understand what's going on with your cellular health and metabolism. It is so cool. They send you a little test kit and you send in a clip of your hair. They send

it off to their lab, they analyze it, and then they come back with the results and they do a metabolic test on your hair, which reveals the status of 29 minerals, including calcium, magnesium, potassium, copper, zinc, iron, selenium, and boron, just to name a few. It also reports on eight heavy metals, including lead, aluminum, and mercury. And then from there, they give you personalized supplements that are sent right to your door every month to keep you on top of your health goals. It's such an easy, simple test to do. There's no blood involved. And then from there, you're actually taking vitamins and minerals that you know that your body truly needs. It's based on your bio-individual needs. And also what's cool about it, as our bodies change, our nutrient

status may change over time as well. And so you're able to retest your nutrient status over time to track your progress and then adjust your supplements as needed. If you guys would like to try honed vitamins today, use code realfoodology for 15% off. Go to livehoned.com, that's L-I-V-E-H-O-N-E-D.com and use code realfoodology and you are going to save 15%. I mean, it should be illegal. It just makes me so mad. And this is just, you know,

this is why education around all this is so important so that we can, as the consumer, navigate, you know, better ways and really figure out where we spend our money. I mean, just thinking about this, like as a consumer and knowing all this, how do we navigate this? How do we support brands like yours? Is it better to buy directly from you on the website? Is it

better to buy from the grocery store because you've already paid those fees? How do we navigate that? Yeah. I mean, and that becomes a double-edged sword too, right? Because online, it seems to be a really good solution to do, right? But, you know, because of the advent of Amazon, consumers are so used to getting things quickly and cheaply and easy, right? And so they want stuff in two days and they want it shipped to them for free, right? And so inevitably we have to eat a lot of the fulfillment and shipping costs, most of them actually, in order to get a consumer product in two or three days, in order to get it to them at a shipping rate that they can stomach, right? When they can get a product on Amazon for free and I'm over here saying,

hey, the shipping's $10.99 because that's actually what it is. They're going, what? Why would I pay for that? So we have a $5 flat shipping and we eat the rest and we eat a lot of the fulfillment costs. So at the end of the day, we don't really make a lot more money um online on most of our orders because we have to eat so much of the cost because consumers don't understand the true cost of shipping and the true cost of fulfillment you know and i'm saying hey i'm i we pay our people a living wage right pay them much more than a living wage right and so like i'm not going to cheap out you know my fulfillment team and i'm not going to cheap out on the shipping um so you can get it for free in two days. And so we have to inevitably eat a lot of that cost. So I think buying in retail is

a good option too, because that's how companies can scale. In order to scale as a small company that's doing the right thing, you have to be able to build a really good story in retail. You have to be able to say, hey, look at my sales here in HEB. Look at how they're improving year over year. Look at my repeat purchase rate or look how many customers are coming back to buy it. You have to be able to build that story. And if you can build a successful story in one retailer, you know, locally or regionally, then, then you have a case to say, hey, if I can be successful here in my home state of Texas, then this is something that I can scale to two, three, four states regionally, semi-nationally, or even nationally, right? And so I think, you know, finding local companies that are producing locally and supporting them at

your local natural food stores, because a lot of companies, they'll start at their local mom and pop, right? The local, you know, if it's a two, one chain store, two chains, three chains, you know, go into those stores, you know, and a lot of those, you know, store managers or buyers or store owners will know the brands directly, right? Because it might be the first store that that brand is ever sold in, right? And go to those local, really small, local mom and pop natural retailers and say, hey, what new brands do you have this month, right? Or what new brands, what are new brands you've had this year? Or what are some really good products that are doing really great things? Because those stores will allow a lot of brands to tell their story a lot better on shelves as well and they don't have the same kind of you know uniform policies a lot of large retailers will so they'll

allow more shelf space or whatever maybe for those brands to tell stories you can really find unique brands smaller brands they're doing the right thing and learn more about their story and talk to the store owners and store managers and really help those brands build a compelling story at that really small local level to give them kind of the resources and the story that they need to go to a store like Whole Foods or HEB and say, hey, like I'm doing really well at this local retailer. Look at, you know, how many units I've been purchased every single week. You know, I've got customers that are raving about me, but they want to find me in larger stores, right? And so I think that would be kind of the best option, I would say, is to work small and local where you can

with the small brands and help them build a compelling story to be able to scale the good work that they're doing. That's so helpful because, you know, I get questions from people all the time. It's probably one of the biggest questions I get on my Instagram is just people knowing how messed up our food system is. And I get questions of like, as a consumer, what can we do? Like, how can we change this? Because, you know, we really do, I mean, exactly what you just said is a perfect example of where we put our money really drives the trends. And I think we just more than ever,

it is so incredibly important that we really do our research into the brands and know that they are, one, doing what they're actually saying, you know, not lying about it, which is harder to, you know, to figure out, but like there are ways to figure that out. And also just finding those brands

that are really, really doing best for our health because what we have to understand is that just because something is on the shelf does not mean that it's necessarily healthy and or vetted for us. Like, honestly, I don't think people understand the disconnect that the FDA and the USDA really has. They're really not looking out for us as well as people think. Big disconnect, yeah.

Yeah, there's a huge disconnect there. And right now with a lot of these larger food companies, they are so focused on profit, they don't care about health. And we need to, as a consumer, start demanding better and putting our money into brands and food companies that are actually providing healthy food over profit. Yeah, it's crazy. And you brought up a good point with the FDA and USDA, right? Because it's, you know, we can't use the word healthy. Legally, we cannot use the word healthy on our bag of granola because it's got too much fat, right. Regardless of that fat's coming from walnuts, it qualifies under FDA law as not being able to use the term healthy. loops, you know, technically can say things that I can't even say on my bag of granola because of how skewed kind of the FDA rules are and lobbies over the years. It's just another way in which

it's just completely broken. Yeah. Well, that's like, it reminds me of, I went to Costco recently and found a massive container of corn oil and it had a big heart healthy stamp on the front. And I was like, this is insane. This is insane. How can we say that this is heart healthy? And I guarantee you probably because of the fat content and you probably couldn't even put the heart healthy stamp on it. Which is insane because your food is what I would be considered to be heart healthy and would probably actually lower your cholesterol while the corn oil is definitely 100% raising your cholesterol and not helping your heart at all. So I just, yeah. I mean, and again, like I want people to hear this from your standpoint as a food business owner, how much regulation is really actually happening with

the FDA and like the USDA? Like I've heard that it's often like the fox guarding the hen house where you just basically have to present, you as a company have to present like this ingredient, like we found it's healthy and safe. So like we're going to use it and the FDA is like, okay, cool. Sounds good. Yeah. Yeah. It's a little bit of the wild, it can be a little bit of the wild west for sure. It can be a little bit of the wild west. I mean, the FDA can give their stamp of approval on something that they call GRAS, right? Which is, which stands for generally recognized as safe, right? And so like, but when I hear that, I go, I don't want to eat something that's generally recognized as safe. What does that even mean?

What does generally recognized as safe mean? Yeah, and it means that there's room. Right, and it means that there's a lot of room for a possibility of it not being safe. Yeah, so stuff like that just makes me crack up whenever I see new ingredients or new, you know, additives being given grass approval by the FDA because I just, again, as a consumer,

like I wouldn't want to, you know, if you went to the store and they said, hey, you know, is this going to kill me? Well, generally, no. Is that something that you... Would you eat the sample? Probably, generally, no. I'm probably not going to put that in my mouth.

I'm probably not going to eat it, right? Okay, well, if you think about... Think about if we were on a ranch. I was just on a ranch last week and we're walking around on the land and I find a berry and I ask my friend who owns the ranch, like, do you think this would kill me? And they're like, generally, like,

probably not. I'm not going to eat it because chances are of it being poisonous could possibly happen. So like, doesn't really give me a vote of confidence that it's not going to be bad for me. Yeah. Generally recognized as not killing people, but I mean, it's general. So, you know, it's just, yeah, it's crazy. Some of the terminology and things that are used and to describe food and food additives. Yeah, and it's a lot of these. I was actually just having another conversation

on another podcast where he was talking about this very similar thing about just the generally recognized and how we just don't regulate our food as much. And there's a lot of confidence being put in the actual companies that are providing their food. And there's not really any checkpoints, like no one's checking up on them, making sure that they are actually doing the things that they say that they're doing. Many come in and look, I'm not saying that there's a total free for all and that there's

no regulation at all. That is not what I'm saying. And I know people love to put words in my mouth. I am not saying that there's not any sort of regulations, but what I am saying is that people are putting way more confidence into these regulating bodies than they should be because they're not regulating as much as we think. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, you know, and it's, you know, and I can understand that from their perspective too, because, you know, what I mentioned earlier, thousands of new food products at the shelves every year. Like, how is one organization going to regulate thousands of new food products with all the different ingredients and all of it? It's just not possible, right? You would need the amount of people you would need to truly regulate everything that hits the store shelf in any way, shape or form.

You know, it's not realistic. And so that's part of it too right it's just there's so much that's that's becoming new and hitting shelves and it's it's incredibly easy for someone to kind of whip something up in their you know their home kitchen and say hey i made this somewhere let me go sell it um it's probably hard to regulate that you know at that at that scale. So it's tough. So yeah, so you've got to, as a consumer, you have to do a lot of that kind of self-regulation yourself, knowing that like there's just, it's not possible for all of these things to be regulated as much as they really should be. Yeah. Yeah. And actually, Vani Hari, the food babe, she reported this, I don't remember,

it was probably like five years ago now, where the FDA actually admitted that they don't even have the manpower to regulate everything that's being put on the shelves. Because like you said, there is so much coming out every year that they just can't keep up. And we're not giving them a pass, but it's just, again, a reminder for the consumer that no one's coming to save you. No one else is taking care of your health if you don't do it for yourself. You have to be proactive. You have to look for the brands and the companies that are doing right by our health.

Like, I'm sorry. It's just the reality of the situation that we live in. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So as we're coming to an end, is there anything about, anything we talked about today, like distribution or the retail exploitation, anything about regenerative farming,

really just anything that maybe we didn't cover that you feel like is really important for people to hear? Great question to catch y'all. I mean, I think, you know, I think you said it really well. You said the impetus needs to be on people to kind of do this work for themselves and take some of the time and energy and effort to look out for things, right? And because there's deception all over the place, there's deception on the farmer side, right? There's deception on the marketing side and on the retailer side. And at the end of the day, all of this, we can sit here and bash all these people all day, right? At the end of the day, you've got to take your health into your own hands, right?

And so kudos to you for everything that you're doing to educate consumers on how to do that, right? Because that's so important, right? Because most people, they don't know where to start and they don't know how. They're like, okay, well, this is great. I'd love to look out for these things, but how do I do that?

What do I do? What keywords am I looking for? What ingredients am I supposed to not be looking for or looking for, right? And a lot of people don't know. and so a lot of that just comes down to like we need more people educating people like you're doing on like what what to look for when they go into stores you know how to shop around what to look for on certain products um what things to avoid and then then we get in a situation where people don't just grab something something because it says keto right they grab something because they're like hey like this has a lot of seed oil in it. Like, you know, or this,

you know, this has, this has dyes in it or this has additives in it. You know, so we've got to be able to educate people on the right things to look for and then the right things not to look for. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's really, really good advice. And I also, I always like to end these podcasts on a really, you know, happy and hopeful note because I know a lot of this feels heavy and doom and gloom. And like, you know, I just don't want people, you know, just throwing up their hands in the air and being like, well, I guess there's nothing we can do about it. Everything's effed, you know? And I don't, I don't feel that way at all. You know, I feel very empowered knowing all of this because

I feel empowered knowing that I can make the right decisions and knowing what to look for and what brands to put my money into. And so I think part of this requires a reframing in the brain of just being like, look, there are a lot of amazing people, yourself included, that are working so hard to change this. They're working so hard to create healthy food products for you, for your family, so that we have these choices, so we have these options. So there's a lot of good happening right now. I would encourage people to watch Kiss the Ground, watch Common Ground. It will give you a lot of hope about a lot of people that are very involved in this on so many different facets, like

from farmers to doctors to registered dietitians to people creating food products, like everyone. There's a lot of people involved and there's a lot of people paying attention to this and really care and want to make a difference. And so I just want to remind people that we've not lost all hope. Thank God we have people like you that are doing this the right way.

And now it is up to us as the consumer to swallow that, know that this is happening, and do the right thing and put our money where it should go. Yeah. Amen. Yeah. No, I agree with you completely. It's trending in the right direction. It really is. We're seeing a lot of big companies put a lot of money and resources and effort behind regenerative agriculture. And whether it's genuine or not, they're doing something about it. They're putting their money into those things. We're seeing what's happening in California with them outlawing dyes and things like that. So there's things that are moving in the right direction for sure.

There's a lot of people doing a lot, a lot of really good things to fix the broken food system and move it in the right direction. And there's a reckoning happening, I think, with consumers as well. When they're noticing, like, man, like, you know, and we notice it down here in San Antonio, right? When three months out of the year, you can't really go outside between noon and 5 p.m. because it's too hot. People are going, there's got to be something we can do about this, right? We're starting to see a reckoning of consumers realizing, like, man, we're really screwing things up for ourselves. And if I want my children and my children's children to have, like, a habitable planet to live on, something has to change, right? And there's a reckoning

that's starting to happen. And so there's a lot of people that are really doing some great things out there for sure. Yeah. And you know how we fix that high heat is regenerative farming, guys, because it pulls the carbon out of the atmosphere. This actually gave me so much hope. I was actually in San Antonio last week, which I wish I had known because I would have come by and said hi to you guys in the office. But we were at my parents' friend's ranch. And these are like deep South Texas, like their family has been here forever for generations. They were talking about how a lot of their friends are really starting to pay attention to regenerative farming now. Like a lot of their friends are really starting to pay attention to regenerative farming now. A lot of their friends are now buying up land, regenerative land. They're just starting to pay attention more. Ranchers and farmers are wanting to do more regenerative practices. The fact that

they're talking about this in Texas, I was like, whoa. And they were talking about how a lot of their friends are throwing a lot of money into this now, which is a really big deal. So people are definitely paying attention and they're recognizing that this is really important. Well, I want to ask you a question that I ask all of my guests, and this is a personal one, and I'm curious to hear what yours are. So what are your health non-negotiables? These are things you do daily, maybe weekly to really prioritize your own health. Yeah. First will be a noon workout every day. It's a non-negotiable. I go to CrossFit at noon every single day. Um, it's a non-negotiable for me. Um, our team knows that I do it. They know that I'm just do not, don't bother me with anything, no emails, no phone

calls, no nothing from like 1145 to one 15 cause I'm out. Um, eight hours of sleep is another non-negotiable for me. I have to have sleep. I think that's so important. Um, I'm a big, I'm a big sleep guy. I've got like the bougie chili pad on my mattress that keeps me at a certain temperature. So the sleep thing is super important to me. Eight hours is definitely non-negotiable as a health thing. But I would say the last non-negotiable also is maybe a little counterintuitive, but it's moderation, right? Because everything has to happen in moderation, right and and so I always keep that in mind too that like it's it's like it's okay to like cheat a little bit on the weekend right they'd like that you have to have that moderation right like like you know you're in this business like me and like

you are right you know so much about food right to the point where like you almost don't eat anything right you can get to that point you're like I don't I don't want to go out to eat anywhere. I don't want to eat anything. You know, at the same time, like you have to like live life as well. And so you just have to keep that in mind of like knowing that like, hey, you know, I'm not going to be perfect all the time. It's just not going to happen.

And that's just kind of part of life. And so I think keeping that in mind is important. I'm so glad you brought that up. I've started doing this more on my Instagram because I think people think that I live this like perfect diet lifestyle where it's like everything's organic and I'm not a perfectionist with it at all. And I've started posting things that I eat that people would not normally think that I would. And I remind them, I'm like, it's about consistency, not perfection. Am I eating this crap every single day? No. Am I eating fast food? No, I haven't eaten fast food

in like 20 years, but I'm thinking more specifically of a time when I was in San Antonio and I grew up eating Tex-Mex. It is my favorite food. I love it. Every time I go to San Antonio, we went to La Fonda for dinner. I had cheesy enchiladas and refried beans and chips and salsa and queso and the whole damn thing. And you know what? I can do that and be okay because I don't eat that every single day. Again, it's about consistency, not perfection. And I was so happy eating that food. I was like, oh, this is like childhood. So yeah, it's a great reminder that consistency, eat those good, healthy, whole real foods as much as you can, but then also live, go out to dinner with your friends,

have chips and queso, have a margarita. Please let everyone know where they can find Wild Way and you obviously, if you want to be found or if you just want to plug Wild Way, however you want to do that. Yeah. Yeah. So you can find us here in Texas, You can find us in HEB, in Whole Foods, Sprouts, Natural Grocers, all over the place. You can find us in Whole Foods in California, in New York as well. You can find our new regenerative organic certified oatmeal line in Whole Foods in Southern California and up in the New York area. Amazing product with some really cool flavors and it supports regenerative agriculture and

the regenerative organic alliance. So please go check that out and support the amazing farmers that are growing things the right way, for sure. Amazing. Thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it. Thank you for having me. Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of The Real Foodology Podcast. If you liked the episode, please leave a review in your podcast app to let me know. This is a resonant media production produced by Drake Peterson and edited by Mike Fry. The theme song is called Heaven by the amazing singer Georgie. Georgie is spelled with a J. For more amazing podcasts produced by my team, go to resonantmediagroup.com.

I love you guys so much. See you next week. The content of this show is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not a substitute for individual medical and mental health advice and doesn't constitute a provider patient relationship. I am a nutritionist, Thank you. to? From the producer of the Real Foodology podcast comes the all-new health and nutrition podcast Digest This, hosted by Bethany Ugarte. You may know Bethany as the face of the popular Instagram page Lil Sipper, or you may have even read her book. Now you can find her wherever you get your podcasts. On Digest This, Bethany examines topics such as gut health, nutrition, the food industry, and highlights specific ingredients that can be beneficial or harmful to your gut health. She also explores non-toxic options in beauty, home, and cooking essentials. If it has to do with your health, Digest This

is talking about it. Each episode features an interview with health experts, doctors, and wellness advocates, and delivers you information that is, well, easy to digest. Bethany also delivers a weekly segment every episode called Bite of Knowledge, where she highlights an ingredient commonly used in food, skincare, household cleaning, you name it, and gives you the lowdown on the benefits or dangers that ingredient might have in your everyday life. From Botox, potassium, olive oil, and magnesium, all the way to those ingredients you can barely pronounce on the back of your cereal boxes, Bethany has you covered.

There's a reason why it debuted at number two on Apple Podcast Nutrition Charts. Check out Digest This on your favorite podcast app. New episodes every Monday and Wednesday. Produced by Drake Peterson and Resonant Media.