Our Mission
Tailored Food works to eliminate hunger for people living in poverty by developing, launching and scaling delicious, low-cost, nutritious, locally sourced food products in partnership with grassroots entrepreneurs to ensure healthy food is affordable and available to families struggling with malnutrition.
Our Story
March 23, 2016: At a hospital hit hard by Ebola on the outskirts of Monrovia, Liberia, I met with the Head Pediatrician, Dr. Jude. Over a long conversation Dr. Jude shared:
I treat malnourished children at my hospital with what UNICEF provides me, but I know most of these kids will die once I send them home. And there is no advice I can give to their mothers - there simply is no nutritious food available in local markets.
This was the spark of a multi-year journey dedicated to designing and taking to market nutritious delicious low-cost food in Liberia. As we started diving further into the landscape of food and malnutrition globally, we realized what our team was learning each day in Liberia could have far broader implications.
Tailored Food was born to partner with ambitious local nutrition entrepreneurs in designing and selling food products to families hardest hit by malnutrition, food products that are delicious, culturally-relevant, incredibly nutritious, and locally produced. Tailored is not a food company, but is a lean social enterprise consultancy that partners with local leaders in the markets we work. We have produced and sold over 5.2 million meals to the lowest-income families over the last five years.
Interested in learning more? Please contact us.
What We Do
Develop nutritious, affordable food through:
Multi-year entrepreneur partnerships – In collaboration with small-scale entrepreneurs in the countries most impacted by malnutrition, we launch and scale nutritious low-cost food products. This work is funded by grants Tailored Food receives.
Systems change through:
Strategic consulting projects for larger organizations – We complete food systems mapping, investment cases and strategic partnership building for clients such as UNICEF, the World Food Programme, Save the Children and Impossible Foods, resulting in nutritious low-cost food that is available to the lowest-income families.
How We Do It
Our approach to food systems transformation includes the following:
1. Solutions mapping:
Conducting qualitative ethnographic field research to learn from stakeholders throughout food systems.
2. Nutritious food product development and launch:
We find the most ambitious entrepreneurs and provide them with a team of top food industry experts to design, launch and grow nutritious low-cost food products in their home markets. We provide end-to-end capacity support for their businesses and facilitate access to capital in order to scale impact.
3. Long-term food systems transformation:
Provide end-to-end capacity support to businesses and access to capital to scale impact.
4. Knowledge sharing and thought leadership:
Share learnings and case studies with food system organization decision makers, showcasing the Tailored Food model to policy makers and organization partners through events and forums.
Why We Succeed
Tailored Food is well-positioned to pioneer an innovative form of international development, leveraging its expertise and networks to ensure nutritious, delicious, culturally relevant, and low-cost food is available to people suffering from malnutrition in their markets every day. Our organization will bring product development and demand creation expertise that will be unleashed at the policy level globally while also being mobilized at the grassroots level in partnership with local for and non-profit food organizations.