Join Christine today as she talks with Mike and Anj, two of the three partners that make up Sous Casa, a delicious frozen food company that donates at least one meal per order to their nonprofit partners. Mike shares his long-standing passion for how bad frozen food tastes, how he developed the business idea with cofounder, Jim Hamilton, over tennis, and how the pandemic inspired them to actually launch their company. Anj talks about her background working with nonprofit organizations, and her experience serving as the initial conduit from kitchen to hungry families before being brought on to the Sous Casa team. Mike and Anj also discuss the food pantries they are currently partnering with, how their Give Back Model has evolved over the past year, and the collaborative process behind their gourmet recipes. They explain the need for more nutritious, quality food drive donations, and share their thoughts on the larger issues at hand, poverty and food insecurity. To order from their tasty menu, donate, or learn more about their mission to get well balanced, convenient, and nourishing food into everyone’s freezer, visit EatSousCasa.com.

For more information, and other episodes on companies and entrepreneurs who give back, please visit www.TheGiveBackModel.com. That’s where you can also let Christine know about companies you’ve found that give back. Thanks for listening!

Episode Highlights:

The idea for frozen, yet very tasty delivery food 

Anj’s experience working with local nonprofits, and serving as the initial conduit to get food where it was needed most, before being brought on to the team

One-Year Anniversary and launching a business at the beginning of the pandemic

Evolution of their Give Back Model from Buy One, Donate One, to donating one meal per order instead in order to maintain the quality of their food

Organizations that Anj is currently working with

Christmas and Thanksgiving donation drives

Stories of how they have been able to help their community

Jim’s creative chef skills and the team effort to come up with new menu items regularly

The need for better quality donations at food pantries and the larger issue of poverty

Their mission to spread the word about food insecurity 

Quotes:

“Our first iteration, our first test kitchen, included a one-to-one donation for anyone who would buy our frozen burritos. We just needed to get people to try them and figure out recipes, and see if it was worth doing it on a bigger scale.”

“I have been talking about how bad frozen burritos are for over a decade now.”

“Most nonprofits serving people living in poverty, especially people in public housing, were pivoting really quickly to get food to the door of the families they served.”

“Jim, as a touring musician with rock bands, was quickly not very busy [because of COVID]… My job involves travel as well, so I was grounded for a bit. We said, You know what? If we don’t do it now, we’re probably never going to do it, so let’s see what it looks like.”

“We’ve trimmed it down a bit, because the Buy One, Donate One is very unstainable with the quality of the food that we’re providing… We tried to figure out what would be a reasonable, viable donation ratio that we could keep up with. We commit to one per order - we donate a lot more than one per order.” 

“If you want to go above and beyond, you can buy a burrito pretty much at cost, and we’ll find someone that needs it in town.”

“One thing that has certainly become very evident in all of this is, the need far outweighs the supply that we have.”

“It’s a team effort from a creativity standpoint.” 

“Sometimes I think Jim’s favorite days in the kitchen are the days he gets to create a new recipe from what he has left over. And that’s the time I think he’s the most inspired.” 

“At that time, they were so isolated, so they were so excited to see us, and talk to us, and also to know that they were going to get a really exciting meal that night.”

“They were amazed that someone was thinking about them. Like it was such a personal touch that they don’t get… Just that in itself was so powerful.”

“Again, it’s not enough. We have a lot of food insecure people in the Richmond area, and it’s kind of a bandaid at this point - food pantries. We’re not really fixing the problem of poverty.”

“We’re not solving any problem. The nonprofits are the ones that are doing the hard work, for sure. We really have the easy job.”

 Links:

The Give Back Model website www.TheGiveBackModel.com

 Follow The Give Back Model on Instagram @thegivebackmodel

 Sous Casa website EatSousCasa.com