Brighter Bites on the Radio
If you thought you heard a familiar voice on the radio a few weeks ago, you were right! On September 26, Brighter Bites’ founder Lisa Helfman made a radio appearance on KPFT Houston 90.1 to talk about Brighter Bites’ origin and impact with Eco-Ology hosts Pat Greer and HC Clark. Pat was excited to learn about the Brighter Bites model, calling our work the “best, grandest, most exciting definition of sustainability.”
Lisa answered Pat and HC’s questions about Brighter Bites’ beginnings, explaining how her family’s participation in a food co-op changed her sons’ eating habits and sparked the idea that the eating habits of underprivileged children could be changed with an increased exposure to fresh produce. She described her very first brainstorming session at an NBA basketball game and how the invitation to work with students at one KIPP school grew into a relationship with produce distributors and nutrition educators and quickly become the Brighter Bites we know today.
Pat and HC asked questions ranging from government support to classroom impact and how Brighter Bites is changing food desert communities. When probed about Brighter Bites’ relationship to public health, Lisa answered that “somehow as a society we have forgotten to make food and healthy eating a priority for health. If we can get produce out and blanket the world with healthier food, people just start picking it up on their own.”
Lisa continued to describe how Brighter Bites is aiming to change eating habits everywhere by increasing demand for fresh produce and thus its availability. “I’m out here to have a national conversation about what this change in eating can do,” she explained.
Pat and HC led an incredible conversation about access to produce in the US and what Brighter Bites is doing about it. At the end of the interview, Pat nailed Lisa’s sentiments about food waste in the US: “There’s not a hunger problem, there’s a distribution problem.”
To listen to the full conversation, tune in here and select the Tuesday, September 26 episode.