In 1994, the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA) was sponsored by conservative Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah, where much of the supplement industry is based. The law was needed to protect the supplement industry from heavy-handed regulation. FDA would do armed raids on little health food stores in small towns just for displaying books too close to vitamins.
While it was originally for supplements like vitamin C, echinacea and 15 years later Cannabidiol (CBD), it also required any food not on the market by October of that year to undergo a more rigorous process as a New Dietary Ingredient. Instead, GRAS allowance was sufficient, which was obtained in 2018 only minutes after the Farm Bill legalizing hemp was signed.
Ironic, since hempseed as a food is older than FDA, and hemp grown in Virginia in 1620 means it is even older than the nation herself. Hempseed foods were on the market for years before, of course, but not well documented and not widely distributed. Those introducing them were long since gone and had no interest in making a case to FDA for grandfathering.
So it was consequential that a month before the deadline, just miles from FDA headquarters, at a natural food trade show crawling with FDA employees, in a booth in the lobby directly across from the escalators most went down to get in, we introduced HempRella cheese alternative and Hempeh Burgers. The DSHEA cut-off was the next month, thus getting legal domestic perishable commercial hemp foods in under the wire. They were the only hemp foods there.
By having a highly-visible booth in the lobby that tens of thousands walked through with people sometimes three-deep sampling hempseed foods, and a two-foot high Cannabis leaf or two on the booth backdrop… it was too obvious even for FDA to miss.
We usually debuted new products at the show but that year started the buzz early. In the foreword to The HempNut Cookbook (2004), the book’s editor and Emmy®-winning Christina Pirello writes:
“The year was 1994. I was in my office, agonizing over the outline for my first cookbook (four books later, I still agonize), when the phone rang. I answered distractedly. “Hey, Christina,” said the warm voice on the line. I relaxed as I recognized the throaty greeting of my dear friend Richard Rose. “Will I see you at Expo?” He was referring to the Natural Products Expo (an annual showcase for natural foods) held in Baltimore.
“Of course! What’s up?” I knew Richard to be ahead of his time, a truly innovative thinker with a penchant for the creative and slightly offbeat. I also knew that Richard had to be excited about something to be calling. We’ve been friends since the early 1980s, both of us pioneers in the tofu industry, always looking to the next horizon. “Come by the booth—you’ll see,” he laughed. Of course, my curiosity piqued, I tried to coax information from him, but in the typical style of my friend, he wouldn’t reveal a thing, except that I’d be surprised.
Fast-forward to the Natural Products Expo. Walking the show floor, I looked for Richard in the soy products section. Not there… hmmm. Looking through the program guide, I found nothing to give me a clue, so I walked the show looking for his signature luxurious, long blond hair. I soon found him, in the midst of a crowd at his booth. I had to work my way to the counter to see what was so intriguing to the delighted mob. I braced myself for the big surprise, only to see containers of tiny little seeds— hempseed, as it turned out. Hempseed? That was it? Surely, he was kidding. I stood back and waited for the crowd to disperse enough for me to get Richard’s attention. After our usual warm, embracing greeting, I drew back and shook my head.
I will readily admit that I thought my dear friend had lost his mind. Aware of hemp and hempseed, I didn’t think much about them, except from an environmental standpoint. I wished that our farmers could still cultivate this valuable crop, which yields fiber for cloth and paper, nourishes the soil, and requires little or no pesticides. I loved the fabric that came from hemp, especially its durability and soft texture. But food? Surely even Richard Rose couldn’t pull off this one!
Over the next few years, Richard educated me about using hempseed and hemp oil as food, and I came to be a true believer that hempseed is indeed the hope of the future. My health and the health of my family has improved even more, thanks to the use of hempseed in our daily diet. Why? Hemp contains more than 30 percent complete protein, with all of the essential amino acids necessary for digestion. It is rich in the essential fatty acids omega-3 and omega-6 (occurring in optimal ratios for long-term health) along with respectable amounts of omega-9, trace minerals, vitamins, fiber, and other essential nutrients. Hempseed is a powerhouse of nutrition. Nutrients essential to the health of humanity and the planet exist in these tiny seeds and the oil pressed from them.
Of course using hempseed for food is not a new idea. It has been enjoyed throughout the world for thousands of years, staving off the hunger of hardworking peasants who ate it for strength and endurance, and as a component in traditional medicine. Still widely used in Asia and Europe, hempseed has been virtually off the radar screen in the United States, thanks to misunderstanding, politics, and special interest groups. That is, until now. Richard Rose, always inventive, honest, and ahead of his time, has seen to that. His decades of trials, tribulations, and experience in pioneering soyfoods served him well as he developed the finest and most creative hempseed foods the market has seen—or ever will see, in my opinion.”
Then, in the Inc. magazine most read on the flight to Baltimore, page 69 had a full-page color photo of me with my products and guitar on a beach. Most knew me as an infamous figure in the natural food industry for years because a food industry trade magazine called me a “leading innovator of 1986,” and for being on the Inc. 500 the year before by selling “America’s most-hated food,” perishable tofu, in the Reagan ‘80s). The Inc. story “Then And Now” read:
“Once a bootstrapper, always a bootstrapper? Not quite. If you’re going to move beyond the start-up phase, there are habits that have to be undone and skills that have to be honed to jibe with your company’s growth and maturity; it doesn’t happen in a single day, but gradually you may find that your business no longer benefits from certain policies and procedures you insisted upon when it was a struggling start-up. For example… […]
“Taking on new roles can be disconcerting. Richard Rose of Sharon’s Finest, maker of TofuRella (“tastes, melts and stretches just like regular cheese”), would rather he didn’t have to spend quite as much time explaining himself and his business to bankers. Rose calls himself a “counterculture businessperson” and “the longest-haired M.B.A. in Santa Rosa”; last summer he toured as guest guitarist for a band called the Pink Flamingos. He says it’s a bit weird getting used to the idea that because the local bank gave him a $160,000 line of credit, “it’s no longer just me doing what I feel.” Still, he’s been able to maintain control of his persona and his style.
“I cut off my hair and wore suits and stuff for a couple years,” he says. “I thought I needed to do that to make it in the business world. And it didn’t work. So I went back to plan B and that was to be myself. And it’s working just fine.”
Pull quote: Richard Rose did what was necessary to earn the confidence of the business world. Now that his company, Sharon’s Finest, is a success, he’s able to relax.” [Then and now. Inc. magazine. Sept 1994, p 68-70, 76-77, by Leslie Brokaw, David Whitford.]
Introducing these sophisticated branded perishable foods to thousands of U.S. and Canadian natural food stores and supermarkets opened people’s eyes to a new side of hemp. While everyone knew it made good rope and clothes, that it could also be a legitimate commercial superfood high in protein and omega-3 was cognitively dissonant for many, but positively mind-blowing for most.
It made for light-hearted news reports on hundreds of TV and radio, and thousands of newspapers and magazines. From Better Homes and Gardens to Rolling Stone, Details to the NY Times Sunday. A CBS-TV afternoon talk show making a hemp potato salad, and Jay Leno made skits and jokes. Ted Nugent respectfully discussing vegan hemp foods and Mancow disrespectfully doing the same.
The zeitgeist was ripe for foods made from the seed of hemp, momentum stronger by the day.
But for our company, it was a natural evolution. Started just 8 years earlier with TofuRella cheese alternative, we eventually added cheese made with almonds, rice, then brazil nuts, so a new hempseed version was a natural evolution. That’s why it was picked up quickly, HempRella was just another line extension from an existing vendor known for professionalism and innovation.
The sales and distribution network that we used to get 950% growth in five years was leveraged for the hemp foods. Supporting the line with $230,000 in ads and PR ensured pull-through at retail.
The vegan Hempeh Burger would later have an FDA-legal health claim “may reduce your risk of heart disease” on the label, the only hemp food ever to do so.
Eventually we had over a dozen HempNut brand foods, some with the FDA-legal Structure-function claim “helps support healthy heart, lung, brain, and immune function.”
We would soon have a “First One’s Free” promotion for a free fill for retailers, one case of each product.
Having authentic fun Marketing is contagious and resonates with consumers better than “Fauxthentic” Marketing ever will.
Click here to read more on how hemp food in 2024 started as tofu in Mendocino in 1980, in Seedy! by Richard Rose. Never before has an industry insider pulled back the curtain on the successful strategies used to create hemp’s biggest industry segment. Part how-to, part hemp history, part self-help. Seedy! is 177 pages, 52,000 words, 200 images, and thousands of links. Cost: free. Value: priceless.
