Genuine Foods CEO, Jeff Mills Offers Entrepreneural Advice to Reader of GoSolo
Good Food Does Good - Genuine Foods
by Team Subkit
Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey in food and beverage but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Jeff Mills, founder and CEO of Genuine Foods, located in New York City, NY, USA.
What's your business, and who are your customers?
Genuine Foods is a quality-focused food service company that provides scratch-made, wholesome, culturally relevant meals created with fresh, vibrant seasonal ingredients to K-12 schools, higher education, senior and hospital facilities, and communities.
Our focus on real, genuine food makes a lasting difference in the lives of those we serve and in the communities where we work, and we help partners raise the bar in the quality of the food and the participation in food service programs. We also provide living-wage jobs and careers in the communities we serve. The powerful outcome of combining good food, good business practices, and good partnerships is how Good Food Does Good.
Tell us about yourself
I started Genuine Foods with the goal of making fresh, scratch-made food accessible to all. I'm motivated by my core belief that everyone deserves immediate access to real food regardless of age, location, situation, race, or any other factor. Previously, I served as the director of food and nutrition services for D.C. Public Schools (DCPS), where we proved it's possible to dramatically improve the taste, quality, and nutritional standards of school food while controlling costs and increasing the number of students eating.
Our DCPS program turned around a $40 million effort, increasing sales by 45% and profit by 15%. We also developed innovative solutions during emergencies, including repurposing old school buildings/kitchens, utilizing creative feeding sites and services, and creating logistics plans with city operations to ensure a smooth flow of supplies into the city and deliveries within the city.
What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?
I believe we have grown an incredibly strong team of individuals motivated by our mission every single day. Being able to partner with organizations like Partnership for a Healthier America and their Honorary Chair Michelle Obama for programs like Pass the Love w/ Waffles + Mochi, a free meal kit distribution across multiple cities providing a collective 1 million meals to those in need, inspires me to keep going and keep building. The work is meaningful, and it's changing lives and livelihoods every day.
What's one of the hardest things that come with being a business owner?
Operating our business during the rise of COVID-19 posed incredible challenges - how do we feed kids when they can't even come to school? How do we make our business model work during a period of immense change? These kinds of obstacles make owning a business very demanding but also very energizing. We found new avenues to feed those in need, and we learned the power of being adaptable.
What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?
Failure is a form of feedback, and you should treat it as an opportunity for growth. Starting a business is a rollercoaster of ups and downs, and if you can't bounce back from the downs, it will be impossible to lead and move forward.
If you're not passionate about what you're doing, how can anyone else be? If you genuinely care, you'll listen to and trust your gut, and you'll get buy-in from others you're hoping will join your business and, down the line, potential clients as well.
Find a purpose that's larger than you. When you figure out what that is, it will become your North Star. You'll see a difference in the kind of people you recruit, the type of investors you attract, and the kind of partners and consumers interested in you.