Wendy Nunnelley is a beverage industry executive and an angel investor in more than 20 early-stage companies, primarily in consumer goods and services. She was most recently a Vice President at The Coca-Cola Company, with experience in strategy, planning, operations, business development, and revenue management, including pricing/promotion. Before Coke, she was a consultant at The Boston Consulting Group. She has been on the board of the most active angel investor network in the US and advises several early-stage companies. 

David Benzaquen is the Founder and CEO of PlantBased Solutions, an award-winning, mission-driven, strategic brand management and marketing agency for plant-based consumer products. PlantBased Solutions helps companies launch and grow their businesses, through marketing, branding, fundraising and more. In addition to PlantBased Solutions, David serves as CEO of Ocean Hugger Foods, a company making sustainable alternatives to popular seafood items. David is a sought after industry expert and public speaker, serving as a mentor and advisor to multiple food incubators, accelerators and funds. David received his master’s degree in management from The New School and his bachelor’s in political science from American University.

Sarah Dorey started at IGNITE Sales Management in 2014.  She came to the company with strong experience across multiple categories (dry, frozen and dairy) and many key retailers (Walmart and Target particularly). A 14-year, award-winning career with General Mills included building expertise in category management, account management, product marketing, trade marketing, merchandising strategy and analysis, and channel management.  Since joining IGNITE, she’s worked or consulted with over 30 clients in this fast growing space in food.  Her passion is ensuring that a brand is maximizing it’s selling capabilities while being very strategic about the resources they use. Sarah is also the founder of PFM Sales Consulting, where she is a Senior sales advisor to companies in the natural and organic food industry.

Her family plays the most important role in her life and a husband and three little girls keep her busy — and being a busy mom has only amplified her awareness of convenient, healthier alternatives for her family in the grocery aisles. When she does find spare time, it’s typically cooking, reading, or getting active outside.

After studying architecture and business at Washington University in St. Louis and interning with several architecture and real estate firms including Mitchell Giurgola Architects, BLTA and Massey Knakal, Aaron founded BOLD Organics (“BOLD”), one of the fastest growing better for you frozen food companies in the U.S. After expanding its products into over 10,000 retail stores, BOLD was sold in 2016 to one of the largest frozen food manufacturers in the country. Through BOLD and other investments, Aaron has built an extensive network of financial and strategic partner relationships. The son of two architects and the latest generation of a family of innovative real estate thinkers that dates back to the 1890’s in New York City, Aaron went on to study real estate at NYU and then formed Grid Capital with Justin Kniepman to leverage his relationships and background to pursue a variety of investment initiatives in real estate.

Lou Cooperhouse is Executive Director and a founder of the Rutgers University Food Innovation Center, a globally recognized food business incubator and economic development accelerator program of the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station at Rutgers University.  Lou is recognized as a leading global authority in food business innovation, incubation, acceleration and industry cluster formation. During his 30+ year career in the food industry, he has led cross-functional teams in a wide array of settings including: new business startups, mid-sized and family-run companies, multinational corporations, foodservice and retail operations, university entrepreneurship and innovation centers, and industry trade associations.

Lou also founded the Food Business Incubation Network, a global network of food incubators, accelerators, and shared-use kitchens; and serves on the Board of Directors of the International Business Innovation Association, the world’s leading organization advancing business incubation and entrepreneurship to early-stage companies, serving over 2,000 members in over 60 nations.   

Noha Waibsnaider is a leading food entrepreneur and change maker in the healthy, real food movement. Originally from Israel, Noha grew up on a diet of mostly unprocessed foods and snacking on dried fruit. While working at Unilever in brand management, she learned about the preservatives, chemicals, and processing that fills most of our foods. She realized there was a big gap in the marketplace and an opportunity to create snacks that make people feel good about snacking, with food that tastes great and is naturally nutritious. In 2005, she launched Peeled Snacks: a pioneering clean-label organic food brand with simple, recognizable ingredients. Peeled Snacks makes dried fruit with no added sugar or preservatives, as well as Peas Please and Puffs, savory veggie snacks packed with plant based protein and fiber. With her vision of providing tasty and nourishing snacks everywhere you need a snack, Peeled Snacks are sold in Target, Hudson News, Whole Foods, Wegmans, Giant, Amazon, and many other retailers. The company has been featured in Oprah’s O List and received Healthy Snack awards from Health Magazine and Fitness Magazine.

Noha has been recognized as a White House Champion of Change, Women Presidents Organization’s 50 Fastest, JWI Woman to Watch, Columbia Business School’s Distinguished Alumna, and received the Ecademy Award for Entrepreneurship. In 2007, Noha founded the NY Foodie Companies group to promote sustainable local food businesses in NY, now with 1,200 members. She’s a frequent speaker on social impact and women in business. Noha has an MBA from Columbia Business School and BA in Spanish and Latin American Studies from American University. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband and two kids.

Kevin Powell and his wife started a flavored butter company in the NYC metro area. Their biggest client was Yankee Stadium. The business made money, but they wanted a product that was more universal and they needed funding. So, they closed down that business and started a condiments business using vegetables for sweetness and drastically reducing the amount of sugar typically found in those products. Kevin brought on a navy vet he had met at a conference to help run the company full time. Over the next 2.5 years, they took the product national with accounts in WholeFoods, Target, Albertsons, Sam’s Club and Blue Apron. They also cultivated partnerships with regional players like Wegmans, HEB, Roach brothers, Big Y, Fresh Direct, Gourmet Garage and Eataly while raising a little over a million dollars from investors. At the end of 2016, Kevin stepped down as president and away from day-to-day operations to pursue other opportunities

Ian Kelleher co-founded pioneering, Brooklyn-based Peeled Snacks when healthy food wasn't yet cool.  As part of a generation of mission-focused food entrepreneurs, he helped lay down industry infrastructure and standards for a ever-improving food landscape we can luckily now take for granted.  He had a hand in every aspect of the business, and grew Peeled Snacks from a cute idea hatched at the breakfast table into a multi-million dollar manufacturer of organic snacks with coast-to-coast distribution.  Since his success exit in 2017, he's helped dozens of food companies large and small navigate the industry's ever-shifted seas.  An expert in sales, hiring, and corporate strategy, Ian is a mentor, coach, board member and investor.  He lives with his wife and two shockingly wonderful children in Brooklyn, New York.

Melanie Zanoza Bartelme is a global food analyst at Mintel, the world’s leading market intelligence agency. She provides insights on global innovation and consumer trends across a number of food categories, with a particular focus on flavor trends. Drawing on her deep passion for food, she previously reported on industry news and trends for the Institute of Food Technologists, where she created a new monthly column devoted to product development innovation.

At Mintel, Melanie co-created the annual US Flavor and Ingredient Trends, which spotlight the cuisine types and ingredients that are growing on restaurant menus and on grocery shelves. She also regularly assesses the state of the food industry by attending trade shows and conferences across the globe and shares her analysis on Mintel’s blog.

Melanie holds a BS in journalism from Northwestern University. In her spare time, she loves to share what she’s eating at home in Chicago or while traveling the globe on her Instagram, @melanietastestheworld.

Daniel Karsevar is a formally trained chef, former restaurateur, business consultant, and product development expert with over 15 years of C-Suite expertise in the food industry. Daniel served as President & COO of Chloe's Fruit, a national vegan CPG brand helping to scale from a storefront location. In 2014 Daniel formed and ran as CEO, Solutiontopia, a consulting agency that launched numerous brands at Natural Products Expo East & West and developed clean label plant-based products for Unilever and other Fortune 500 companies. Daniel currently serves as CEO of PlantBased Solutions, an award-winning business services company helping brands develop, launch and scale plant-based food products. He is also a mentor to many food incubators & accelerators, as well as a contributing industry speaker and writer.

Kate Starr, is the Chief Investment Officer of Flat World Partners, where she drives the investment philosophy, product development, and portfolio management for the firm. Previously, she led the capital deployment team at the Heron Foundation that invests Heron’s approximately $300 million portfolio for impact. Kate started her career as an economics and equities analyst at First Asset Management and moved into research on microfinance in Tanzania. She is a CFA and active member of NYSSA’s Sustainability Committee and advisor to the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board. Kate serves on the investment committee of the Christopher Reynolds Foundation and Impact Assets. She also advises Humanity United’s Worker Innovation Fund. Kate graduated from Indiana University with an Honors degree in English and Italian, and earned a Master’s degree in International Relations and Economics from Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies.

Mario Rodriguez has more than 13 years experience in creating value in start-up companies that span many industries. He brings a unique background in food & beverage with an operations mindset. As a graduate from Babson College, Mario started his career with a software and services start-up which specialized in process re-engineering for clients in the finance, energy, and aeronautic industries. After 6 years in consulting, Mario decided to jump into the food world and attended the French Culinary Institute, graduating top of his class. He later worked in many culinary institutions including the Gramercy Tavern (NYC) and La Petite Grocery (New Orleans). Mario’s second leap into the start-up world came with Dinner Lab as director of operations and helped scale the business from 3 locations into a total of 31. His next endeavor brought him back to NYC and into the new meal-kit industry as COO of Dinner Thyme. Mario was instrumental in constructing the supply chain, hiring of culinary staff, establishing daily operations and kickstarting the overall growth of the company. Mario Rodriguez is a big advocate for early stage food start-ups and provides consulting services (via Bootleg Avocado) to those companies who need guidance with expansion, scaling, hiring/training, fundraising, supply chain management, and overall execution of their food product.

Andy is the founding partner of Theory, a consulting firm that advises growing companies on brand positioning, consumer research, and go to market strategies. Prior to his work with startups, he he helped Fortune 500 brands like MetLife and Budweiser to organize their global integrated marketing practices, and worked on the product team at Citi cards. Andy is also an adjunct at NYU where he teaches brand strategy and digital marketing.

Renée Vassilos is The Nature Conservancy’s Agriculture Innovation Director. She manages TNC’s investments in early stage agtech companies that will support regenerative agriculture production- at scale. Prior to joining The Nature Conservancy, Renée spent nearly a decade at John Deere, including several years based in Beijing, where she worked across corporate functions and geographies to build global market product strategies, design and manufacture equipment, and marketing and sales through John Deere’s best-in-class distributor network. Post-Deere, Renée led her own consulting firm, Banyan Innovation Group, advising growth-stage agriculture technology start-ups and investors. Renée has a BS and MS in Agricultural Economics.

Michael is a designer, educator, husband, father, and full-time cyclone of energy. He is the creative director and founder of Ocupop and co-founder and investor in multiple impact-driven companies. Michael has been helping to define the visual language of our digital experience for 20 years. At Ocupop, he has led projects for companies, foundations, and non-profits at all ends of the spectrum—from Google, Facebook and Mozilla to the IRC, ProPublica, Disney, and the W3C, Michael has directed Ocupop's team in creating some of the most influential logos, campaigns, and user interfaces on the web and beyond. Michael also serves on the executive committee of the Sierra Club and sits on the board of Sustainable America.