Greater Good Blog

This week, Arabella Advisors and its food-system investment team announced the launch of “Good Food Ventures III.” Good Food Ventures (GFV) is a private impact investing club that provides members with access to hard-to-find, professionally vetted, early-stage impact investment opportunities. All opportunities identified are related to building a true “Good Food” system—one that delivers delicious, nutritious, sustainably produced food for all. This is the third year in which GFV will bring investment-ready deals to individual private investors.

The potential long-term value of food system innovation is hard to overestimate. Agricultural practices in the United States are major contributors to global climate change, inefficiencies in the supply chain waste nearly 1/3 of the food we produce, and a historical drive towards producing cheap calories rather than nutritious foods has made diet-related disease the leading killer in America. All the while, hunger grows both globally and domestically, despite a strong economy.

The demand for delicious, nutritious, sustainable and accessible food far outstrips supply, and entrepreneurs are stepping up to fill the gap. Private investors see opportunity for impact and financial success in this sector, but many lack access to high-quality investment opportunities, and few have the capacity to complete effective deal analysis to make informed investment decisions. As a result, significant capital targeted for this sector is sitting on the sidelines rather than being deployed to support innovation and a better food system.

Good Food Ventures uses a four-step process to help correct for this market failure, closing the gap between would-be investors and fully vetted, investment-ready opportunities through:

1. Sourcing – The GFV team tracks over one hundred early-stage companies each year
2. Due Diligence – Investment professionals fully vet compelling opportunities
3. Deal Presentation – Selected companies pitch to the full GFV membership
4. Investment – Individual GFV members confidently make their own independent investment decisions

Eric Kessler, who leads the Arabella Advisors Good Food team, says, “Good Food Ventures provides deal flow and analysis to investors interested in improving the food system. Our members benefit from our networks, take advantage of our market expertise, share ideas and insights, and make better-informed investment decisions designed to achieve all of the returns they seek—financial, social and environmental.”

Good Food Ventures members include many of the most significant private individual, family office, and foundation impact investors in the field. They bring capital and connections to the businesses they invest in, critical for early stage businesses that anticipate rapid expansion and future financing needs.

In past years, the club has sourced and vetted dozens of opportunities from across the Good Food supply chain, including:

• OCEAN HUGGER FOODS: a consumer-packaged-goods company that creates sustainable, plant-based alternatives to mass-consumed seafood, starting with a tomato-based ahi tuna alternative.
• BLACKDIRT FARMS: an agriculture operations business focused on grass-fed and pasture-based livestock, with a goal of transitioning traditional agricultural lands into regenerative livestock operations.
• REBOUND TECHNOLOGIES: an efficient and operationally flexible cooling technology that can reduce energy use, food waste and the environmental impact of the current industrial cold chain.
• EVERYTABLE: a fast-casual, healthy and organic restaurant chain with a pricing strategy that leverages high-income, Southern California communities to subsidize prices and enable healthy food access in Los Angeles food deserts.

To learn more, contact steve@arabellaadvisors.com.