The proper management of food safety is critical for consumers, retailers, and manufacturers. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), foodborne illness impacts an estimated 48 million people each year in the United States and costs an estimated $15.6 billion. Legislative headwinds have significantly changed the landscape for both incumbent and emerging food brands to reach compliance and access markets; most of the industry is still paper-based.
Enter FoodReady. FoodReady democratizes access to food safety standards, reporting and compliance for emerging and incumbent food businesses by digitizing what has traditionally been a paper-heavy process. Food Ready is a comprehensive Quality & Food Safety Management platform. Think about them as the ‘Quickbooks of Food Safety,’ handling daily record keeping plus reporting for annual audits and inspections.
Why is this needed? The current regulatory environment makes it difficult for small brands and businesses to (1) know what is needed in a food safety process (daily records, traceability, or an Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points plan) and then (2) implement that process, (3) publish the documentation for FDA approval, and (4) continuously maintain the system they’ve put in place. Food Ready found that not only do small and medium sized food businesses face these challenges, but large companies as well, especially continuous food safety monitoring.
For context, the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) was signed into US federal law in 2011 with a goal to improve food safety by shifting the focus of federal regulators from responding to foodborne illness outbreaks to preventing them from occurring in the first place. FSMA gives the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) new powers to regulate the way food is grown, harvested, processed, and transported. The law applies to all foods regulated by the FDA, including fruits and vegetables, seafood, dairy products, and packaged foods. As recently as late January 2023, FSMA continues to roll out additional requirements, this time requiring those who manufacture, process, pack, or hold foods on the Food Traceability List (FTL) maintain records containing key data elements associated with specific critical tracking events; and provide information to the FDA within 24 hours or other FDA approved timeframe. These policy evolutions provide a tailwind for FoodReady’s team to help retailers, grocers, and manufacturers to digitize their food safety compliance and management systems.
We resonated with FoodReady’s mission to provide access to their software to a broad set of users. Their impact metrics include the diversity and primary language of users as well as number of small businesses, defined as having less than 50 FTE, on their platform. Our hypothesis is that this will substantially open up access to retailers for emerging brands.
The team comes to the table with extensive experience. Co-CEO & CTO William Metz spent nearly 15 years at Argonne National Labs as a software engineer before working as an independent contractor and technical expert in software development. He started FoodReady with the vision of automating documentation required by the FDA. Co-CEO & Head of Sales Gerry Galloway has decades of expertise bridging his work in the public sector with his sales expertise to help forge private-public partnerships in telecommunications, health, and across the food industry. Most recently he was the Director of Business Development at Lauras International where he worked with large F&B companies (such as Kraft-Heinz, Conagra, and Pete’s Coffee) to improve their operational efficiencies. Through this work, he observed how siloed, yet essential the quality management departments were. Dave Seddon, Co-Founder & Head of Food Safety and Operations completes the executive team with 30 years of experience in food safety.
FoodReady currently services customers in the US. The company will expand its footprint across Latin America with a Spanish-language version of its software. We’re thrilled to be teaming with this Chicago-based company to help businesses small to large improve their food safety management.
Reach out if this is a service that is interesting for your business!