Haas Undergrads Take On Big Food

Haas Undergrads Take On Big Food by: Nathan Allen on March 16, 2016 | 0 Comments Comments 126 Views March 16, 2016Alejandro Velez (left) and Nikhil Arora founded Back to the Roots at the end of their senior years at UC Berkeleys Haas School of Business. Courtesy photoOn the fringe of Jack London Square in Oakland, California, stands a row of  old brick buildings. The buildings were there when a youthful Jack London ambled along the waterfront watching ships filled with crops and produce dock in the Oakland Port. Now, in one of those brick buildings, 20-somethings in t-shirts and jeans scurry about a large room filled with cardboard boxes. On a bookshelf,  Black Faces in White Places rests against a 30-year-old copy of McGraw Hills  Financial Accountingpossibly the truest indicator of a business with a social pulse.This is an incredible moment for people wanting to take on food, insists a grinning Nikhil Arora, a graduate of the UC-Berkeley Haas School of Business. There is a massive disruption happening. Arora would know. Instead of ships docking with produce at the nearby port, his team is frantically passing around mushroom grow kits, mini water gardens  and boxes of stoneground cereal flakes. Arora founded Back to the Rootsa startup  hellbent to undo foodwith Alejandro Velez, another Haas student, in 2009. And what began as an odd experiment in a fraternity kitchen has bloomed into a multi-product, $7 million venture capital-backed commercial food company in just under seven years.The big food brandsyour Krafts and Kelloggs and General Millsare getting hammered right now, Arora continues. They cant compete. Theyre not connecting with this generation anymore. Theyre on a totally different wavelength. The entire ecosystem is being shaken up.GROWING MUSHROOMS FROM COFFEE GROUNDS WASTEBack to the Roots is setting out to do exactly what the name conveysconnect with a generation through radical transparency and a reconnecting with the earth and food that comes from it. Confidence gushes from the lanky Arora as he discusses why he thinks big food is about to be upended. And why he thinks his venture is one to pave the way. The Irvine, California native has a massive grin and laughs often. He arrived on the campus of the University of California-Berkeley in 2005, where he majored in political science and business. In a business ethics course at the Haas School of Business taught by professor Alan Ross, Arora learned something intriguing and random.This fact came up that you can grow mushrooms from coffee grounds, recalls Arora. So he sent Ross an email asking for more information.  He (Ross) said, honestly, I have no idea where it came from. I think I read it somewhere. But, you know, another student asked about it and you two should link up,' remembers Arora.The other student was Velez, who is originally from Medellin, Colombia. It was coincidence or fate or something, bursts Arora, now unable to muzzle the excitement. Despit e both majoring in business in a relatively small program, the two had never met. It was the last semester in the same class and we both caught on to this random factliterally one sentenceand we both reached out after class via email, says Arora, seemingly still in disbelief at the randomness of it all.BARGING INTO CHEZ PANISSEThe two soon met and bonded over their obsession with growing mushrooms from coffee grounds. They spent days watching YouTube videos and reading internet articles on the obscure idea.   We searched growing mushrooms and you can imagine what crazy stuff came out of those searches, laughs Arora.Nevertheless, the duo read enough to feel confident they could do it themselves. So they snagged 10 paint buckets and attempted to grow 10 batches of mushrooms in the kitchen at Velezs fraternity house. Alex (Velez) would receive emails from his fraternity saying, who the hell left the lights on? What the hell is growing back here, recalls Arora, again laughing. We turn ed the kitchen into an experiment. Then they left for spring break. When they came back, nine were contaminated and not growing at all. But one of them had this gorgeous crop of mushrooms growing out of it, says Arora.They waltzed straight to nearby Chez Panissean upscale cafe owned and founded by world renowned chef and foodie, Alice Waters. And Waters happened to be there with her head chef.  He said, Oh my God, these are delicious,' remembers Arora. And that was the first confirmation we had.The two sashayed their crop to all the nearby grocery stores. But these arent your normal grocers. This was Berkeley. They went to upscale grocer, Andronicos.   They went to the Berkeley Bowl where the produce section takes up half the store and people walk around barefoot as  dogs wait patiently outsidethink every single hippie-chic Berkeley stereotype and Berkeley Bowl is the epicenter. But all the managers of the produce sections shared the assessment by the Chez Panisse chefthe two business majors could grow delicious mushrooms.THATS WHEN WE SAID FORGET CONSULTING, FORGET BANKINGWith their undergraduate days ebbing, the two had to make a decision. Would they try to grow a mushroom business or go down the consulting and investment banking paths theyd spent four years sending themselves down? A  timely and game-changing $5,000 grant from the universitys chancellor and an agreement to supply mushrooms to the local Whole Foods led them to choose the former.Thats when we said forget consulting, forget banking, exclaims Arora. He had spent time working at Raymond James Financial, while Velez had worked at both  Morgan Stanley and Qualcomm. But Arora also spent six months working for a recycling company in Ghana, and Velez was very involved in UC-Berkeleys Sage Mentorship Program.  We were both really passionate about business but also sustainability and education, explains Arora. And growing mushrooms off of something thats waste, we thought this could be both a business but something deeper.Coffee ground waste is a problemespecially for large brands such as Starbucks which  has  created a policy on how to properly dispose of the grounds. Grounds are also commonly used by gardeners because they slowly release nitrogen into soil. Page 1 of 212 »