Living Maxwell
Company Stories
For as long as I have been covering the organic food industry and giving out Natural Products Expo West awards, it has always been a Top 5 list.
However, due to the incredible number of fantastic products that I saw at the 2024 show and at the urging of my good friend Liana Werner-Gray, I have expanded the list to a Top 10.
Living Maxwell
Company Stories
For those of us who are fans of Dr. Bronner’s, the company’s products have a constant presence in our households, and we use them to clean our bodies and physical surroundings on a daily basis.
While this is unquestionably a critical component of our lives and imperative to maintain good health, cleaning transcends removing whatever is on our skin, on our clothes or on our kitchen countertops. It also affects our emotional well-being and directly impacts how we show up in the world.
And this is precisely why Lisa Bronner’s Soap & Soul: A Practical Guide to Minding Your Home, Your Body and Your Spirit with Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soaps spoke to me so much, as it squarely touches on the importance of cleaning both the tangible and intangible — an essential formula for a meaningful life.
Living Maxwell
Company Stories
For as long as I have been covering the organic food industry, I have attended Natural Products Expo East, with my first show in Boston in 2009.
So, it is very bittersweet to report that after last week’s show in Philadelphia, there will be no more Expo East moving forward. New Hope, the organizer of the event, has decided to launch something new in 2024 called Newtopia Now.
Living Maxwell
Personal
In the summer of 2001 and at the urging of my then-girlfriend, I went for an appointment to go see her naturopathic doctor in New York City, the place where we were both living at the time.
Having done acupuncture since high school, I had always been open to alternative medicine and was curious what this woman could do for me.
During our session, she asked me about all of my health and dietary habits – eating, drinking, smoking, drugs, exercise. Everything. In the midst of this conversation, the topic of organic food somehow arose. I remember that I had some notion about what organic food was but wasn’t overly familiar with it.
A message from Tradin Organic
At Tradin Organic, we believe that regenerative organic farming is key to growing healthy and nutritious food ingredients — for now and for future generations.
And in Sierra Leone, we have grown the world’s first Regenerative Organic Certified cacao.
Organic Insider
Must-Read
If you read in the media or someone tries to convince you that organic doesn’t matter, do not believe them.
It does.
And it could potentially save your life.
In a just-released, peer-reviewed study, four families across the country were fed both an organic and non-organic diet, and the ones who ate all organic saw their pesticide load drop by as much as 95%!
Living Maxwell
Company Stories
Recently, I stopped by the offices of Sakara Life, the fantastic organic meal delivery service based here in NYC.
Even though I have known co-founders Danielle DuBoise and Whitney Tingle for a few years, I hadn’t fully researched their company until now. And what a huge mistake that was because it is an incredibly impressive operation with delicious food.
Currently, Sakara Life is delivering fully-prepared, 100% organic, gluten-free, plant-based meals (breakfast, lunch, and dinner) to customers in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Massachusetts. The service will eventually be expanded to other parts of the country, with California on the company’s near-term radar screen.
Here were a few things that I tasted.
Living Maxwell
Must-Read
Each day, more and more news comes out about the harm that pesticides can do to our bodies.
This time, a report out of Europe says that pesticides can cause brain damage. Yes, brain damage.
Living Maxwell
Company Stories
With celebrities rushing to invest in organic food companies these days, Sarah Michelle Gellar truly stands alone.
This long-time Hollywood actress isn’t writing a check, fading into the background and hoping for a payout several years down the line. She is doing the exact opposite.
Sarah Michelle Gellar is helping to run and is playing an active role in building one of the hottest organic food brands in the industry. Along with her two other co-founders, CEO Galit Laibow and COO Greg Fleishman, Foodstirs is redefining the healthy baking category by using the best organic and Biodynamic ingredients available.
In addition to her acting career and responsibilities at Foodstirs, this Emmy Award-winning actress and mother of two recently released Stirring up Fun with Food: Over 115 Simple, Delicious Ways to be Creative in the Kitchen, her #1 best-selling book. Organized by the month, Stirring up Fun with Food succeeds because of its approach — providing engaging “food-crafting” ideas that help kids develop self-confidence, creative thinking, and even math skills in the kitchen.
A message from Tradin Organic
For more than a decade, Tradin Organic has been working with local partners in The Philippines to bring a diversified range of organic products to the market, such as coconut oil, tropical fruits and even cocoa.
The company is helping to support local farmers by assisting them with technical support and organic certification, in addition to paying Fairtrade premium on top of the organic premium.
Living Maxwell
Personal
As I wrote about the other day, it was during college when I went on antidepressants. Each day was getting harder than the next. The sky was growing darker and darker. It was a major struggle just to survive.
I was overwhelmed with a variety of responsibilities — school work, in which I seemed to be drowning; the tennis team, which occupied several hours of my time per day, not including constant traveling to other schools for matches and tournaments; and my fraternity, something in which I was very actively involved.
With my voice becoming more heavy during each phone conversation, my parents suggested that I go visit a local psychiatrist to see if he could help. More specifically, they thought that antidepressants were the answer. After a brief chat with the doctor, he diagnosed me with a mild case of depression and believed that Prozac would indeed improve my situation.
Living Maxwell
Better Choices
For those of us who are extremely committed to health and wellness, the reality is that maintaining this lifestyle is very difficult when traveling.
At home, we have much greater control over our environment, but we lose that control when we go on the road, regardless of how aesthetically pleasing the living conditions may be.
Fortunately, the world is starting to change, and there are now businesses entirely focused on meeting the needs of the wellness-minded traveler.
One such company that I recently discovered is Pure Wellness, whose main offering is a Pure Room — a hotel room unlike anything I have seen before.
