Tending Leaders Chapter

Neil Blomquist

As an extension of that experience, he has established a consulting company, Sustainable Solutions, to specialize in the development and marketing of sustainable business solutions for the industry. Mr. Blomquist spent 10 years on the board of directors of the California Olive Oil Council, and holds board positions on the American Botanical Council and Natural Habitats. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree in business management and economics from the University of South Dakota.

Mark Griffin

Vincent Kitirattragarn

Vincent is a New York City native who started his career research environmentally and socially beneficial products for the City of New York. He moved to the Bay Area to work with GoodGuide, a natural product ratings company headed by a UC Berkeley Professor. There he helped create rating systems for hybrid vehicles, food and beverage items, recycled paper and other categories. His academic background includes two engineering degrees from Cornell University and five years of sustainability and natural product research across the public, private, and non-profit sectors.

Dang Coconut Chips are sold in 7,000 locations around the US, including Whole Foods, Target, Kroger, Safeway, Stop n’ Shop, The Fresh Market, Sprouts, CVS, Amazon and many independent grocers. The coconut chips are made of sliced copra (coconut meat), seasoned and toasted to perfection. The toasting process caramelizes the sugars and creates a wonderfully buttery umami flavor from naturally occurring aromatic coconut oil. It’s a wonderful snack and a healthy alternative to fried chips, dried fruit and nuts. For home cooks, it’s a versatile topping that can be used to enhance ice cream, yogurt, salads, oatmeal and baked goods. 

Vincent holds both Bachelor and Master of Engineering degrees from Cornell University and currently resides in Oakland, CA. He is a Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree and received a SOFI Gold award for “Best Snack” for Dang Original Recipe Coconut Chips.

Ken Lee

Caryl Levine

Sheryl O’Loughlin

From 2015 to 2019, Sheryl was CEO and “Chief Love Officer” of REBBL, the first plant-based, super herb adaptogen beverage company. In partnership with Not for Sale, a nonprofit dedicated to creating a future without human trafficking, REBBL works to create regenerative and just supply chains.

Sheryl is co-founder of the Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (J.E.D.I) Collaborative. She is also co-founder and board chair of the Women on Boards Project, a nonprofit with the mission of empowering women business leaders and improving diversity and inclusion at the board of directors’ level across consumer brands. Both non profits are focused on supporting and advocating for a more inclusive industry and economy to drive innovation, growth, profitability and justice.

Earlier in her career, Sheryl served as the CEO of Clif Bar and Company. There she led the concept development and introduction of Luna, the first whole nutrition bar for women, which became a $70 million business in three years and continues to be a core brand in the company’s portfolio. She went on to co-found and serve as CEO for Plum, Inc., a healthy, organic food company that aims to nourish kids “from the high chair to the lunch box.” In 2013, Plum was successfully sold to Campbell Soup Company.

After Plum, Sheryl was the Executive Director of the Center for Entrepreneurial Studies at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, and she held a faculty position at Sonoma State University, where she taught hundreds of aspiring entrepreneurs and other professionals.

Sheryl currently serves on the board of directors for Pet IQ Inc. (NASDAQ: PETQ) and the board of non-profit One Step Closer (OSC) as well as the advisory board of S. Martinelli and Company, a family-owned company. She is also a member of the Forbes San Francisco Business Council. Previous boards include Zuke’s Natural Dog Treats, thinkThin Nutrition, Sugar Bowl Bakery, Gardein Plant-based Nutrition, FoodStirs Junk Free Bakery, Once Upon A Farm, American Sustainable Business Council, and the Harvest Innovation Summit. Sheryl supported Zuke’s, Gardein and thinkThin to successful exits.

Sheryl earned her Bachelor of Business Administration from the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan and her Master of Business Administration from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. An avid camper and traveler, she lives in Santa Rosa, California, with her husband, Patrick, and their two sons.

Learn more at www.sheryloloughlin.com

Ahmed Rahim

At Numi, Ahmed travels to remote regions of the world seeking unique herbs and teas unknown in the United States, building partnerships with farmers and their communities. Numi has proudly benefited the farming community by increasing wages, sponsoring schools, hospitals, community centers, road construction and other needs to improve living standards in farming communities.

Ahmed and his sister Reem have been evolving their vision for Numi through the Numi Foundation, with initiatives that focus on local and global programs, acknowledging and addressing the challenges within their farming communities and in their backyard of Oakland, CA; from education to health and nutrition. Numi Foundation’s Together for H2OPE project is providing clean safe drinking water to farming communities across the globe.

Ahmed co-founded OSC, One Step Closer, a national community of sustainable natural products CEOs and business leaders. OSC strives to leave earth and humanity in better condition than we found it by inspiring natural products leaders to work in innovative and collaborative ways toward positive change. The group addresses the toughest sustainability problems facing our industry and our planet by building new regenerative business models and agricultural systems

Ahmed sits on various for-profit and non-profit boards enhancing their growth and sustainability goals. Ahmed’s core goal is to be in service to those focused on caring for their community and creating positive change for our environment.

Company Website: numitea.com

Edouard Rollet

Prior to launching Alter Eco in the US, Rollet was a Senior Trade Attaché at the French Embassy in New York where he specialized in foreign investment, new ventures, media, marketing and mass retail. He has also consulted for the communications department of the UNICEF in Dakar, Senegal. Rollet holds an MBA from The European Institute of Business (IEA-Paris) and an MA in Mass Communications from the University of Florida.

Born in Lyon, France, Rollet moved to the US two decades ago. He enjoys traveling, the outdoors and exploring street food and restaurants around the world. Rollet resides in Mill Valley, Calif. and is married to Ilse Keijzer, founder of Alter Eco Pacific, which serves the Australian and New Zealand markets.

Frederick Schilling

In 2001, Frederick founded Dagoba Organic Chocolate, the first chocolate brand in the United States that not only rooted the triple bottom line principles of Planet-People-Profit to that industry, but also opened the door to using chocolate as a canvas for embracing exotic flavors and promoting single origin chocolate, giving rise to the chocolate industry as we know it today.

After selling Dagoba Organic Chocolate to the Hershey Company in 2006, Frederick then went on to co-found three more influential global companies in the organic market.

In 2008, Frederick teamed up with Diego Badaró, a 3rd generation cacao farmer, to start AMMA Chocolate, a vertically integrated chocolate company with operations in Bahia, Brazil.  The mission of AMMA is to use cacao as a catalyst for rainforest preservation and restoration.  Today, AMMA is regarded as Brazil’s premiere chocolate brand, recognized for its contribution to the country’s environmental and social efforts and for its quality.

Frederick also co-founded Big Tree Farms in 2008; based on Bali, Indonesia, with his business partner Ben Ripple.  BTF is now Indonesia’s largest organic food company, operating the largest organic coconut supply chain in SE Asia with over 10,000 small holder farmers.  BTF is the global pioneer of coconut blossom nectar-based sweeteners, the fastest growing alternative organic sweetener and coconut aminos.  BTF also built, which at that time in 2011, was the world’s largest Bamboo structure.

In 2015 Frederick co-founded Medisun Farms, a hemp cultivation enterprise with a focus on growing organic feminized hemp for the production and extraction of CBD and other valuable cannabinoids.  In 2018, Medisun Farms and Kler Solutions merged to create Klersun.  Today Frederick is CEO of Klersun, which has become a major ingredient solution provider in the emerging hemp-cannabinoid industry.

Cynthia Tice