Experts Council

Our Experts Council is composed of key stakeholder groups including raw food manufacturers, retailers and customer groups.

 

Brad Gruno
After the 2001 dot-com crash, Gruno, a former telecommunications executive, found himself out of work, overweight, and depressed. To get his life back on track, he moved back home to Pennsylvania, where he began to frequent a raw food restaurant. After learning more about the raw food lifestyle, Gruno decided to adopt a 100-percent raw diet. Within three months, he shed 40 pounds. “I started to glow, and I felt so great and clear,” he says. While Gruno loved eating raw, he missed the crunch and texture of his old diet, so he dehydrated raw vegetables in his garage to make chips. In 2009, Gruno started selling the chips at a local farmers’ market, then expanded to four more markets and later a local grocery store. In 2010, he began selling his products to Whole Foods Markets nationwide, and since then Brad’s Raw Foods has grown exponentially into the $15-million-a-year business it is today.

 

Blessing Horowytz
Blessing has been selling her specially-spiced kale and un-baked cookies for more than six years, at farmers’ markets, natural-food grocery stores, and health-food shops such as Whole Foods. An early adopter in the raw-food movement, she’s also a former Silicon Valley recruiter and, at one time, a dream worker. Making Kale Chips is not about producing greens on the go to rake in the greenbacks, says Blessing. She produces raw goods for the greater good, to feed the mind, body, and spirit

 

 

Susan O’Brien
SusanO’Brien, a native Houstonian and University of Texas at Austin design graduate, started Hail Merry Snacks in 2006 after traveling to Maui where she fell in love with Superfoods and the raw food lifestyle. For Susan, “Going Raw”, an evolution of Vegan, seemed a natural progression from her decade-long yoga practice. Her journey would take her to California where she trained with famed raw food chef, Juliano. Back home in Dallas, her pool cabana would be transformed into a test kitchen for raw snacks, which were then sold into a local natural foods market. Hail Merry quickly gained a devout following of vegan, gluten-free and raw foods enthusiasts who share a love for fresh, great tasting, and pure ingredients that offer superior taste and unique side benefits. Susan spent years designing clinical laboratories and feels right at home in a commercial kitchen. She is adamant about seeing to it that her kids are not riddled with toxic food additives and dyes.

 

Joshua McHugh
Joshua McHugh is the founder of Living Intentions, a food company that delivers great new products with the vision of becoming a wellness and lifestyle company. At the age of 13, Joshua was diagnosed with diabetes and began researching how he could optimize his health. His search took him towards raw foods as a healthy, sustainable alternative. His initial inspiration was to take cooked foods and make ten times tastier raw food versions! Quality Ingredients, Integrity, a Clean Pure Eco Friendly Space and Balance are the values that support his mission to bring the average American into the awareness of how raw food can help them optimize their health.

 

Rob Freeland
Rob Freeland is the founder of Go Raw, a food company based out of Mountain View, California. Go Raw’s mantra is to be an inspiration to children first, but ultimately to everyone. His idea is to get Go Raw to help us change the way we eat. Go Raw has helped bridge the gap between healthy food and tasty food and continues to help make really healthy eating enjoyable. Go Raw will soon be moving to their new solar-powered 65,000 square foot facility in San Jose.

 

 

Dr. V.A. Shiva Ayyadurai
Dr. V.A. Shiva Ayyadurai is a renowned systems scientist and computational systems biology expert. Passionate about holistic approaches to health and well-being, he is the founder of the International Center for Integrative Systems and creator of Systems Health – that integrates Eastern and Western systems of medicine to create a new convergent medicine that is fully consistent with the scientific method.