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Paul Tylla | Heal
94 Plays4 months ago
Holistic nutrition, delicious meal replacements, plant-based innovation, and the healing power of love, science, and determination - THAT’s what’s in store for you in this episode of Aisle 42 where I talk with Paul from Heal. If you’ve ever blended up some smoothie or vitamin powder and felt like your taste buds, body, and bowels deserve better… then you’re going to love this conversation.
And for those of you interested in this kinda stuff, yes - Heal is a part of our Ethical Food Group family.
To learn more about everything Paul and his team are up to visit https://drinkheal.ca/
To learn about who is behind this podcast go to: https://www.ethicalfoodgroup.com/podcast
Here’s a summary of this interview:
Introduction to Heel: Paul Tylla shares the inception of Heel, a plant-based nutrition product inspired by his personal experiences and commitment to providing better nutritional solutions for his loved ones.
Vision of Future Grocery Stores: Paul envisions a grocery store of the future filled with whole foods, sustainability, and an emphasis on quality over quantity, where food acts as medicine.
Personal Journey: Paul's journey into entrepreneurship began when he cared for the mother of his children, who was diagnosed with ALS. This experience led him to question the quality of nutritional products available for the sick.
Challenges in Product Development: Paul discusses the complexities of formulating a high-quality product that meets Health Canada's guidelines for meal replacement without using synthetic additives.
Focus on Health: Heel is designed for people who prioritize health, vitality, and longevity over mere appearance or performance enhancement.
Plant-Based Ingredients: The decision to make Heel plant-based was driven by a desire to avoid cheap fillers and to leverage the nutritional benefits of plants, reducing inflammation and promoting overall health.
Consumer Feedback: Consumers report feeling tangible benefits from using Heel, such as increased energy and improved well-being, due to the high bioavailability of the plant-based nutrients.
Product Versatility: Heel stands out for its ease of use, palatable taste, and lack of common issues like chalkiness found in other nutritional powders. It can be easily mixed with water or other beverages.
Commitment to Quality: Heel's formulation is rooted in a commitment to providing the best possible product, avoiding compromises on quality, and ensuring that every ingredient is beneficial.
Educational Mission: Paul emphasizes the importance of educating consumers about the benefits of plant-based nutrition and the holistic approach of integrating nature's intelligence into product development.
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Transcript
Introduction and Purpose of Heal
00:00:00
Speaker
This is IL-42.
00:00:07
Speaker
Holistic nutrition, delicious meal replacements, plant-based innovation and the healing power of love, science and determination. That's what's in store for you in this episode of IL-42, where I talk with Paul from Heal.
00:00:20
Speaker
If you've ever blended up some smoothie or vitamin powder and felt like your taste buds, body, or bowels deserve better, then you're gonna love this conversation. And for those of you interested in this kind of stuff, yes, Heel is a part of our ethical food group family. Okay, let's get into it. Here's Paul from Heel.
Host's Personal Experience with Heal
00:00:39
Speaker
Paul, I am so excited that we're talking and it's probably because I've been enjoying your product now for a few months. It's become a real part of my daily routine and I enjoy it so much. So I'm really looking forward to getting into all the details. But before we do that, I have to ask the big question. And that is if you were to imagine the perfect grocery store of the future, what would that look like? Oh, wow. Well, I think it would be one filled with Whole Foods at the same time. I think a grocery store where sustainability was built in.
00:01:15
Speaker
and there was a deeper understanding of quality over quantity, particularly when it comes to our nutritional needs. So kind of a balance between almost the idea of your pharmacy as your grocery store, like you can get your health from your grocery store and in in the form of products like Heel, but at the same time, you can get your fund and the creative pieces that just make food enjoyable. Just kind of knowing that collectively, all of those things together are moving you in a direction of vitality and longevity and you know illness prevention and just the opportunity to be educated. I think grocery stores have a huge opportunity if they really chose to. to
00:01:54
Speaker
how people become more aware around how food is medicine and how it has a massive impact on their their health and their life. I don't know if that's a good answer. yeah that's a Yeah, you get bonus points. That's that's well said. you know And it actually segues really well into just a little bit of ah a story. it's ah I don't have a question for you just yet, but I just want to say that I've been a consumer of your category for many, many years.
00:02:17
Speaker
And you know based on our shared work together, Rick Williams said to me, like it's like the new formulation, it's ready, you gotta try it. And I'm like, okay, you know you know i'm I'm game. And it came to my home. And I've got tubs of powders, I've got green stuff you know and with scoops. And I've been putting in blenders and shakers for a long time. And when I tried yours, there are two things that happened. The first thing was within two hours, I felt energized.
00:02:46
Speaker
And it was notable. i'm like maybe i was some other Maybe I had an extra espresso. I don't know what it was. But every time I used it since then, I've always felt a very slow, careful, beautiful release of of what feels like natural energy. It's no spike. I just feel like a boost. Kind of like a vitamin B12 shot kind of a thing. Just felt really energized.
00:03:09
Speaker
The second thing was that, there's probably no real good way to say this, but down there I felt a lot more comfortable later in the day. How's that for some colorful language? But I just, it really, really enjoyed your product. So first off, I want to say thank you.
Paul's Motivation and Vision for Heal
00:03:26
Speaker
But my first question about your product is, and this is, you know, very, as a, as a founder, you you know, founders have stories, some founders have more elaborate stories than others. Your story is very personal. You got into this for a very personal reason. So, and I think listeners will be curious to learn more about why in the world you would get into a very crowded category, a difficult product to make, um but one that you feel is important for you and the people around you.
00:03:55
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, um on a personal level, we were legally separated at the time, so I'm challenged sometimes putting her under a category. But the mother of my children and somebody that I loved very much ended up with a really horrible disease called ALS.
00:04:10
Speaker
And inside of that diagnosis, even though we were apart, I made the decision to take care of her full time. We have two adult children together. And inside of that disease being a ah neurological disease, essentially what ends up happening is your your neurology slowly starts to turn off. You lose the ability to speak, move, eat, and eventually breathe, which in most cases leads to death.
00:04:34
Speaker
um It is a palliative disease. ah But along the way, with that journey of of caring for Linda and just wanting to give her the best, um we bumped into feeding tubes. Because when you can't swallow, the only way that you can get nutrient is through a feeding tube.
00:04:50
Speaker
It's a mechanical implementation of a tube literally goes through your demo wall into your stomach, and you're pressing liquid through that tube into that person's stomach so that they don't die. I was introduced to products by ah but Nestle and Abbott. The product that was recommended to me through the medical system was a product called Complete, which is essentially the same thing as like Boost and Insure, and certainly not something that I would want to drink 10 of a day for the rest of my life.
00:05:21
Speaker
And so, you know, just out of a want for better and the fact that Linda couldn't really speak and express herself, I made most of her decisions based on what I would want for me. And I think that that's what really took a turn. You know, what's going on in this space? Why are we giving people who are sick a subsistence?
00:05:40
Speaker
Why aren't we recognizing that our sickest people deserve our best food and our and our best alternatives, not our worst? And so I started blending and formulating at home. And yeah, there was no reason for me before that to even look at the category or consider entrepreneurship or even the idea of of creating this kind of a product. But when it came to loving somebody the way I would want to love myself and having a sports and nutrition background um just by virtue of you know the things that I do, I've been a career firefighter for 25 years. I own a CrossFit gym. I've been competing in that in sports for a long time. I just knew that nutrition was a huge component inside of performance.
00:06:20
Speaker
And in Linda's case, the performance that we were looking for was one of Gila, which obviously you can see segue into the name. So really just out of a desire to want to give people like Linda an alternative, what I was doing for for her at home quickly became something we realized could be a legacy for her her story and the the loss that our family went through when she passed.
00:06:45
Speaker
and could help a whole lot of people, not just sick, but healthy, because ultimately, biology the biology of this is no different when we're sick or healthy. It's just the goals of what is it that we're we're attempting to do. So that's kind of the background and why I got going on this thing. So a bit of a mouthful. A bit of a mouthful. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I appreciate the share. Yeah, I appreciate that. And I think that you know you' The story of how a brand comes together and how products end up on shelves when we go a few layers deeper and we hear you know stories like this of real people and real impact on you know and someone's well-being.
00:07:25
Speaker
how, as you call it, food is medicine, can be a really powerful thing. We can all benefit from
Product Development and Challenges
00:07:31
Speaker
it. And to that point, when I first started exploring your product and more importantly, started consuming your product and you know putting two scoops of green powder in a shaker or in a blender, and I started to look at the ingredients and I realized, oh my gosh, I understand all of these ingredients. that these These words, these these names, these descriptions are all, I can easily pronounce them. They're familiar to me.
00:07:55
Speaker
And the the combination of them is actually very enjoyable to drink. And of course, the category is full of a lot of chalky, a lot of you know really aftertaste and um after effects. you know Some are great and some are not. And ah when I started to enjoy your product, it really stood out to me that Obviously, it is not as easy as someone like you might make it seem that it is hard to pick really great ingredients and have great suppliers to pull it all off. So talk just a little bit about the product once you started realizing that this is something you wanted to put on shelves for other people. How easy was it? How hard was it? Or how hard is it?
00:08:38
Speaker
Well, I mean, looking back, the claim of what you're going to do versus the journey of how you end up doing it, ah you know, we started out with the idea of, oh, we're going to take what I'm making in a blender and put it into bags and make it.
00:08:51
Speaker
accessible to people, you know what I mean? Just because Linda was having so much success with it with a 100% food-based formula. But when you start getting into the shelf life, when you you want to start focusing on stabilizing the phytonutrients in the plant, not having you know the oxidative properties of water ah impact those nutritional elements, not wanting to have to keep pasteurized. like You start learning more about how food is made. That's where we landed on a powder.
00:09:20
Speaker
Then when you start getting into well what is something that people can trust. So that the other part of our category is not only is it flooded but it's flooded with a lot of products that are making claims and and oftentimes are making those products with the best of intentions. Their goal is profitability. Our goal has always been to produce the best possible product with whatever ingredients we can find.
00:09:43
Speaker
and get that ah developed and designed under a guideline that but not just you know the consumer could trust, but also the practitioner. So we meet Health Canada's guideline for meal replacement with our product. Obviously, the murder the word meal replacement or that that statement sometimes gives people a, what am I replacing a meal? It's just the category. It's the thing that gives us the guidance so that we can actually have something that we can formulate towards.
Innovations and Market Observations
00:10:09
Speaker
And yeah, just the idea that there's like over 37 ingredients, we've got stuff coming from Switzerland, you know what I mean? Like the the the list of raw materials required to make this product, and then really the the ability to take those ingredients, get what they call the certificate of analysis, understand what the food values are, the expressions of micronutrient and macronutrient,
00:10:33
Speaker
and then blending them all together in a combination that expresses and meets the upper and lower limits that are accepted by Health Canada. It took a year and a half to formulate because we really have done something very, very special and very unique. We're literally the only company to ever meet that guideline without using synthetic ice with additives for the micronutrient ah requirements of the formula. So it's really, it just turns into something that but people can trust. The blood, sweat and tears that went into getting it done.
00:11:02
Speaker
We're really just rooted in the same values that we applied to Linda's care. People just deserve the best. She deserved the best. And so I can't attach her name to something that I wouldn't want everybody to know was good for them and creates a lot of those great those outcomes that you described that you're having for yourself, right? So whether it's your sick loved one, whether it's yourself, whether it's you know a family member, whether it's just wanting to make sure that you're getting enough vitamins and minerals that are coming and fruits and vegetables that aren't
00:11:34
Speaker
wilting on a shelf. It just, it ticks a lot of boxes. But yeah, it was a tremendous amount of work. And if it wasn't for Linda and that inspiration, I can tell you I probably wouldn't. I understand.
00:11:45
Speaker
yeah I walked into our local i don't know like supplement store. It it recently opened. It's strategically placed between two very large corporate gymnasiums, Club 16, Trevor Linden gym, and then ah ah Fitness World, Steve Nashy types. Anyway, there's there's a bunch of really, really big gyms around ah just up the hill from where I live.
00:12:07
Speaker
And so the supplement store opened up and after a few weeks i can walk by it often i don't normally go into stores like that but i thought i'll go check it out so i walked in there and you know there's a lot of stuff to look at the shelves were packed right right to the ceiling.
00:12:24
Speaker
And I said, um you know where are your plant-based options? And they're like, oh, yeah, over here. And so I'm like, OK, great. And I follow up the salesperson to the far wall in the back corner on the ground, the bottom on the ground next to, like I don't know, foam blocks and kettlebells. There was one little area for plant-based.
00:12:46
Speaker
And like I said, I shop the category. I buy plant-based proteins and meal replacements and and and supplements. And I didn't recognize the brand. I'd never seen it before, which I thought was a little surprising. And then I, of course, picked it up and turned it over and looked at the ingredients and and nutritional facts. And it was so unappealing just to read alone.
00:13:07
Speaker
But when I think and you you highlighted you know like the fitness and performance, people who are really looking to optimize their performance, what kind of feedback are you getting from consumers that are they're already doing this type of thing and then they start using your product and how is it impacting their ability to do the hard work and to exercise or in their jobs perform at a really high level?
Consumer Motivations and Benefits
00:13:33
Speaker
Yeah, I think it's important to define, through to me, what are the three different categories of why a person works out first, though. It really showcases why that that store has a market. Because truthfully, that people work out for three different reasons. They work out for appearance, they work out for performance, or they work out for health. The interesting thing is is that a healthy person will perform well and look good.
00:14:03
Speaker
But a healthy person won't take steroids, a healthy person won't take, you know, all sorts of performance enhancing drugs. But a person who wants to just perform and isn't worried about health will.
00:14:14
Speaker
And the person who just wants to look a particular way might actually do a whole lot of things that aren't really healthy for them in the long run. But it gives them that the outcome expression or that that physical look that they're looking for. right So for me, you know focusing on those people who just desire health, then recognize that health comes from exercise and activity that gives them performance and then also turns into a body that expresses in a beautiful way. Those types of people love heal.
00:14:42
Speaker
But they're not not oftentimes the ones that go and shop at some of these stores that you're describing. We're probably more of a direct-to-consumer product because it does take a little bit of education. It does take a little bit of conscious awareness around what am I doing to my body and why? Once a person gets started on heel, not um unlike yourself, the adoption rate is really high and the continued use is very high because they literally feel it.
00:15:11
Speaker
there's ah There's a tangible aspect of like, my body's been starving for a lot of the things that are inhaled. And I think that that's where people, whether they understand it or not, we're all suffering from varying degrees of malnutrition. We're literally missing the micronutrients.
00:15:28
Speaker
for our body to make its own medicine and heal So when you actually get the the expression of all of these different micronutrients, the magnesium, the zinc, the iron, all it's all coming from a plant-based source, the bioavailability of it is just much higher than a synthetic.
00:15:46
Speaker
You just absorb it properly. It's paired with the right sugars, proteins, fats, fiber, you know what I mean? Like we're taking a leaf of spinach and we're buying it frozen. It's been frozen and and and the the oxidative quality of water has been taken out. But we haven't removed any of the pieces of the leaf, right? You're getting the whole plant just without the water in it and you're just rehydrating it when you drink it. So I mean to answer your question is is I don't know anybody who uses heal that doesn't feel a benefit But it it requires them to understand What is it that they're actually getting from it to maybe really see how it impacts performance? I think the other thing is is that like
00:16:28
Speaker
When it comes to the world of performance, any really high-level athlete now has a dietitian. They're getting their food highly monitored. They're not just using products that you buy at a supplement store. In a lot of cases, they're not even oftentimes taking supplements. And that's ah just another distinct distinguishing factor between our product and something that you might find in one of those stores. Kiel is not actually a supplement. It's a food.
00:16:55
Speaker
because we literally put nothing in it other than food-based ingredients. There's no tax on it in Canada because it's a food. What we've done is we've just been able to take all of these amazing ingredients, working with an amazing food scientist, powder them or have them powdered, compound them literally by weight and by measure to meet a guideline that supplies you with all of the vitamins, minerals, and trace elements your body needs for performance. So you literally just can't help but perform better when you take something like yeah I had a conversation with me a few months ago and she commented that she feels like there's a protein crisis and that a lot of people are obsessed with protein or I was looking for protein.
00:17:36
Speaker
when in fact in her words were when is the last time a doctor said to you you have a protein deficiency like that it isn't part of that there isn't a protein problem we just think that there is in our diets what's your take on ah protein consumption volume of protein for someone that wants to be healthy well i think that the thing that people forget is protein serves a lot of different purposes um no different than fats and carbohydrates. They're building blocks, but they're also just fuel. So protein is used by your body to build a lot of the essential amino acids that it needs just for cellular health and and to develop and build muscle. and But when you have too much of it, your body just uses it for fuel.
00:18:23
Speaker
It literally really just burns it like ah like ah for for calories, right? So I guess what ends up happening is you're right, this desire to go, I need X amount of volume of protein to achieve a particular goal. I think that spun out of the bodybuilding industry. I don't think that's particularly relevant to the average person who just wants to be healthy and perform well.
00:18:44
Speaker
I know that people who really get into the counting of their macros, so this is the the balance of fats, proteins, and carbohydrates, so they get, again, a particular type of physique, are very protein-driven. But I mean, there's all sorts of different science on it. And then at the same time, it's like, how many grams of protein am I getting versus the amount that I'm actually absorbing and my body is utilizing to build muscle comes down to protein quality and type.
Ingredients and Ethical Commitment
00:19:08
Speaker
So it is a science unto itself.
00:19:11
Speaker
I think that what's happened is people have been drawn in the direction of it because it's something to buy. like Protein powders are extremely cheap to make and very profitable. so kind of Spinning back into the industry of of protein, you walk into a store, you saw all these supplements. Categorically, it's going to be something that's a pre- or performance-based product.
00:19:32
Speaker
thank Then it's going to be the building block, which is your proteins, your PCAAs, all of these types of things. And then at the last, you see the tiny little shelf of plant-based stuff. The reason that those companies don't carry a lot of plant-based stuff is because it's expensive to make. The bottom line is is that protein, like whey protein, is an extend extremely cheap byproduct byproduct of milk. And it's in everything. It's in everything. So so if they can convince you that you need 250 grams of protein,
00:20:02
Speaker
and each scoop is 30 and they can make it each scoop for, you know, 25 cents, but they can sell it to you for $2. That's a great margin for them. And then if they can literally tell you, you need to consume 250, there's literally math per person on how much money we're going to make just by convincing you to eat all of this plant may or this animal based protein. So yeah, i'm I'm not a huge fan of just focusing in on macros. I think that where people really would just see a biological improvement in the way they perform. Even creating muscle is is a biological action, like your body has to be functioning in a healthy way just to even make muscle. but So that synthesis of protein into muscle also requires all of these micronutrients. That's where people are losing out. That's what people are missing. Nobody in North America is starving for and calories. let's Just look around.
00:21:01
Speaker
But what they're missing is all of the micronutrients necessary for their body to perform optimally and actually burn a lot of those fuels and and make the things that they want to make. And protein is one of those things that we've just been convinced is something we should buy lots of, just like I would say the same thing of sugars and carbohydrates. It's just a different customer.
00:21:21
Speaker
So and the in the health space, let's sell people protein and everywhere else, let's sell them junk food. And in the middle, we'll just remove all of the nutrition because we really just want to have a bunch of sick people walking around eating the things that we tell them that are going to make us the most money.
00:21:36
Speaker
my That's my my snapshot of a conspiracy theory. Sounds pretty accurately accurate, for sure. ah Yeah, it's it's come from somewhere, that's for sure. I put your product right behind me. i wanted to It didn't fit on my shelf. My shelf was too short. It's gigantic. What is this? It's almost 1,000 grams. Let's talk about sort of the the vegan Dairy free sort of play. i I feel like certainly in our home it that is a that's a that's a showstopper We have to make sure that there's no dairy in the in the products that we're consuming. So in the
00:22:14
Speaker
plant-based world and you know we all know in the in the food business we all know that plant-based is important it's growing it's sort of a very broad brush you know broad stroke um when it comes it's not like there's a plant-based aisle you know it's it sort of spreads throughout but it's an important piece of the puzzle when it comes to being responsible with food making and food growing and the fact that the animal, animal welfare and animal production is just very, um, it's taking its toll on the planet and on our communities in which they they are raised. What's it been like to be firmly in the plant based world with your product and what's been some of the feedback you've heard on that side of the equation?
00:22:58
Speaker
Well, i mean I think that interestingly enough, I probably made it plant-based for a different reason than you have shaped your household and your home. like My motivations in the beginning were to to meet a need for the Beacon community. It was ah it was a byproduct of just wanting to make the best product. So what it challenged me to do is ask a lot of really tough questions. Why are these other companies using dairy? Why are these other companies filling their products full of oil and sugars? like what's what's the the advantage to doing it that way. is It's just cheap. It's just cheap. And when you actually design something to give you what it is that your body needs, you just slide in the direction of plant-based. It just didn't make sense to put milk or to put you know meat proteins or anything else into that into that product. And so once I got into that space and I started to understand like
00:23:55
Speaker
more about some of the the science and the research that's been done about, you know, inflammation and how inflammation impacts your body and and is a breeding ground for lots of different systemic diseases that we face in our society, you know, diabetes, cancers, heart disease, hypertension. So many of these spin out of inflammation and meat is just a huge contributor to inflammation. so That's kind of where I've come from with it. is like I want to make a product that just gives people what they're missing, gives them a better chance at vitality because vitality is ultimately the key to longevity. If the B Corp wins or the planetary wins inside of that, ah that we're we just need less animals.
00:24:42
Speaker
and we have less greenhouse gases and we're not you know transporting water all over the planet you know because we're freeze drying at source. there's a lot of There's a real ethical piece to the company that spun out of just wanting to do the right thing for a human being. It just challenged us as a company to go, if this has got to be good for people, it's got to be good for people, place, and planet. It's got to be good for community. it's got to right So I guess it it hasn't just kind of stayed inside of the vegan space.
00:25:12
Speaker
it's been more of that B Corp conversation or that ethical brand type of conversation of how can we steward this product in the direction of the consumer knowing that we're not doing anything and and to harm the planet or hurt anyone in the process. So it's become very holistic for us in the way we view business and the development of any product we're making now we will make in the future. I love it. That does answer my question. I want to just say that when it comes to ah flavor, texture, mouthfeel. Let's just be honest. In you in this category, mouthfeel, aka that chalkiness, that pastiness that's often there, your product doesn't have those attributes, if they're called that. It's very easy to drink. It's enjoyable. I feel like It's got this way like I don't have to blend the crap out of it. I don't have to add a bunch of stuff to make it palpable. I i really it's that texture that goes a long way to making it enjoyable to consume to the point where like I said because it's in my in my daily habit, it's I'm excited about enjoying it. I literally I look forward to it. It's not like oh I gotta
00:26:23
Speaker
I gotta do my nutrients, I gotta gotta take yeah i gotta to do my greens, and I gotta, yeah, plug your nose exactly right, like you gotta choke it down. And of course, anytime you have those unpleasant experiences, I can't help. ah Remember way back, do you remember when Power Bars first showed up? Remember how we were choking those things down, because we thought that they were helping us, but my gosh, they were so unpleasant. But there's been so many products along the way that, you know, that Are supposed to be helpful but they're not but in your case just how great it is to drink it and i have found just ah just some customer feedback for you i've been kind of decreasing the amount of liquid that i add so it's a little bit even a little bit thicker and i don't have to consume quite as much volume you know of my beverage.
00:27:09
Speaker
I've done, you know, whether it's blending or shaking or ah the other day, I even just stirred it with a spoon and it worked. I wasn't expecting it to actually to work. You don't even need to, you don't need a shaker. Right, exactly. And that that really, you know, you shakers with little,
00:27:24
Speaker
things inside to agitate them and we're normally we're doing all these things so I just wanted to say thank you and I really appreciate it and I want the only mistake I've made with your product is this when I when I first started ordering it I got so excited I did a subscription off your website which is perfect and I'm still a subscriber But um i may be overdid it a little bit after i had to call after about a month i had to call your customer support and say you know what we need to dial it back just a little bit i can't get through it all but um what a wonderful problem to have and i really enjoyed it so i just wanted for listeners where can people find a heel and where can people get what they need.
Sales and Consumer Education
00:28:04
Speaker
Yeah, we're mostly direct-to-consumer, so web-based. The website is drinkheel.ca. ah Again, that's drinkheel.ca, all one word.
00:28:16
Speaker
And yeah, we have shifted in the direction of ah the subscription. The beautiful thing about the way we built this this the subscription now though is that you can actually, um you will get like an email in advance letting you know that your product is getting ready to ship and you can pause your order. You don't have to get it. ah So if you do get a bit of a buildup, you don't have to actually turn it off. You can just kind of pause for for a period of time. And that's what we really want, right? We want people to be consuming it.
00:28:42
Speaker
one a day as ah as a baseline, but we all know that life happens and that's not always the case. yeah The other nice thing about our website is is that it will educate you a little bit more about some of the things that we're doing and and why we did it. Learn a little bit more even about um the different ingredients that are in the product. That's a question.
00:29:00
Speaker
and can do a bit of more of a deep dive. And what you'll see from us as a company moving forward is we're very focused on education, which is why I'm even on this podcast. like I want people to to learn and understand the beautiful complexity that nature created when it made food. And we've evolved with the biology of the planet. And this is what's so crazy for me about all of this, right? Is that we think we're smarter than the innate intelligence of the planet.
00:29:30
Speaker
But we've come from it. like you know We were designed to live harmoniously with the things that are in nature and what nature has provided for us. So to isolate things out and to move in the direction of making things that we feel like we can control, we've caused a lot of our own problems in the food space. And you know if this has done anything to me, it's really challenged me to learn and open my eyes up to why the industry is what it is.
00:29:59
Speaker
And some of the things that you commented even about the the feel and the texture and the flavor and all that kind of stuff, that like that's because I didn't change nature. I just took the water out. racism We literally just we've just measured things. We've we've appreciated how it expresses.
00:30:17
Speaker
And then we put them into, you know, measured by weight and and blended them in the proper ratios so that you get this expression of um nutrition. But the other things that we haven't done is we haven't put binding agents in it to make it so that it just stays consistent once it's mixed. yeah just that That's what you're getting sometimes inside of that palatability. We haven't tried to make fruits and vegetables taste like vanilla and chocolate. Like where in nature Do strawberries and blueberries and raspberries and kale and like in combination. They just You know what I mean? It just isn't going to taste like chocolate So that's where we went the direction of just building on the natural notes that's coming from the the fruits and vegetables that that make up heel So it's a it's a really cool thing to and then I appreciate your feedback Excuse me to see how When you work with nature, you don't work against it
00:31:11
Speaker
And you just, you learn about it and you refine it in a way that it can be more functionally appealing to people. That's what's so cool, right? Like I'm helping people eat four servings of fruits and vegetables every time they drink heel. How many people sit down and actually eat four servings of fruits and vegetables every day? not man like you did And it's super expensive.
00:31:37
Speaker
So yeah, so one of these other products, they they've they've really just not been able to hit the mark because of the reason why it's just that simple, right? We just, we are not willing to compromise on the quality of our product as it relates to our customers. Well, beautifully said and a balance of ah scientific and poetic. Oh, thank you. Well, yeah, it's something I'm passionate about. And, and I think when you're passionate about something, it's easy to talk about it.
00:32:06
Speaker
I'm not in the business of convincing people. I just care to share, but I'm not emotionally attached or connected to the outcome. It was for other people to decide. I just knew that people like Linda deserved an alternative. You know, she had no voice and she had no choices. And it just, it just grew from there. And I just realized there was a whole lot of people who were struggling with options and the ease of it and having something that they could trust, like,
00:32:34
Speaker
I've met a lot of vegans. I i i was ah a yogi for quite a few years. I taught yoga, and I met lots of vegans. And the one thing I will say about the community is they're very focused on all the things that you describe, but some of them aren't educated to the importance of balanced nutrition.
00:32:51
Speaker
And so I met a lot of them that just were eating kale every day and they weren't, you know what I mean? They just, it was more of a diet of avoidance than a diet of of health. And so it's really great to see like organizations like Planted Expo and, you know, what we're doing with EFG and ethical food group and products like mine, where now people can trust that, Hey man, I don't have to think about it anymore i can make this choice as a family i can make this choice as a consumer i can trust products like heal I can go out and live a healthy, active life, be ah a person living my virtue and my values as a vegan, and I don't have to worry about being malnourished because i' I'm avoiding things that have ingredients in it that I don't want to eat. That's the beautiful thing, I think, of that what you're describing is that growing movement in the grocery stores where it's just it's spread out now. It's an option. It's kind of getting to be everywhere. love it Well, thank you so much for what you do.
00:33:46
Speaker
while you do it. It's a beautiful product and a beautiful story. And I'm obviously extremely proud, you know, with Ethical Food Group being, you know, in the mix with you guys and supporting you. And I can't wait to see it everywhere. Or at least if you're, you know, especially online, just more and more people jumping on board, going to drinkheal.ca and and checking it out. So thank you, Paul. And really enjoy, you know, being able to have this chat. iss probably It's been a conversation a long time coming. So I'm glad we could connect today. So thank you.
00:34:16
Speaker
Yeah, no, it's an honor and a pleasure. And thank you for having my honor. I really appreciate it your time. Thanks for listening to this episode of IL-42. To learn more about everything Paul and his team are doing, visit drinkheel dot.ca. That's it for me. I'm Corwin Hebert. We are Ethical Food Group, and I'll see you in the future.
00:34:45
Speaker
you