Grant Stoll

Why a farmer-owned co-op like Organic Valley beats industrial dairy: Organic Valley: founded in Wisconsin 1988 and owned by ~1,500 organic family farms, making up the largest farmer-owned organic cooperative in the U.S. Stable pay price: the co-op sets farmer pay rather than leaving small dairies exposed to the volatile commodity milk prices that have wiped out tens of thousands of U.S. dairy farms Small herds: its farms average ~70 cows, versus the mega-dairy model driving consolidation

Convenience is the enemy of good health

Pilgrim Pride’s price-fixing scheme shows why to never trust Megacorps with our health 2012-2017: Pilgrim's Pride participates in a national broiler-chicken price-fixing + bid-rigging conspiracy that affected at least $361M in its own sales 2020: Federal prosecutors indict Pilgrim’s top executives (including then-CEO Jayson Penn + predecessor Bill Lovette) in the Big Chicken price-fixing scandal 2021: Pilgrim's is the first company in the cartel to plead GUILTY and is ordered to pay ~$108 million in criminal fines and civil settlements to grocers and restaurants 2025-present: Pilgrim’s is still majority-owned by JBS, the Brazilian meat giant now facing a separate DOJ and USDA antitrust investigation

How is it even possible that they’re about to spray glyphosate across Lake Tahoe’s national forests and it’s not front page news

Driscoll’s Berries rap sheet reads like a crime thriller… 2013: Retaliation against organizers of the farm worker union (FUJ) that forms at Driscoll's largest Pacific NW supplier 2015: Farmworkers at Driscoll's-affiliated BerryMex strike in Baja California to demand an end to $7/day wages, abuse of women in the fields, and child labor 2016: FUJ + Baja California workers call for a global boycott of Driscoll's-branded berries 2019: Driscoll's files a federal patent-infringement suit against an independent strawberry breeding program started by former UC Davis researchers 2025: A federal court told Driscoll’s it could not use U.S. plant patents to police crossbreeding outside the country and Driscoll’s appealed 2026: Data shows residents in Santa Cruz County have 38% higher childhood cancer rates than state average

You will never shop for beef the same after watching this…

America’s Largest Carrot Grower Poisoned People and Is Owned by Private Equity: November 2024: Grimmway Farms, based in Bakersfield, California, recalls organic whole and baby carrots sold across the country Brands hit included Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods 365, Wegmans, Cal-Organic, Nature’s Promise, and more The outbreak sickened 48 people across 19 states, hospitalized 20, caused one case of kidney failure, and killed one person in California Grimmway grows roughly 65% of America’s carrots, which means even “organic” food can still come from a massive industrial supply chain When one company grows 2/3 of a crop, a single failure becomes a national outbreak

Data centers are wiping out precious American Farmland

Four Food System Failures Directly Funded By The Taxpayer: 1. We Subsidize Food Waste: Taxpayer subsidies fund corn and soy for animal feed, wasting up to 160 million tons of edible food each year instead of feeding people 2. The Junk Food & Chronic Disease Loop: Subsidies make ultra-processed ingredients cheap while real food gets little support, driving diet-related disease that taxpayers then pay to treat 3. The Crop Insurance & Disaster Cycle: Public programs incentivize chemical-heavy monocultures that degrade soil and pollute water, leaving taxpayers to cover cleanup costs 4. The Factory Farm Bailout Loop: Government bailouts absorb the risks of industrial livestock, enabling expansion that increases the likelihood of future crises and even more bailouts

Big Agriculture has become so corrupt, farmers are literally being locked out of their own tractors

The chemical: PCE, also called Perc or tetrachloroethylene, the old-school solvent used to dry clean clothes The cancer link: California lists PCE as a known carcinogen, and exposure has been linked to kidney cancer, bladder cancer, and other serious health risks The source: California has ~7,500 current and former dry cleaner sites sitting under strip malls, apartments, schools, and neighborhoods The leak: PCE spills and leaks have moved into soil and groundwater, creating toxic plumes beneath entire communities, and those PCE vapors rise up from groundwater as well The cleanup problem: California phased out PCE dry cleaning by 2023, but the contamination it left behind will outlive everyone reading this

People are somehow still buying $12 private equity backed eggs instead of local

5 times Tyson Foods got caught redhanded: price-fixing, child-labor and pollution 2021: Agreed to pay $221.5M to settle broiler-chicken price-fixing claims 2022: Washington State's separate price-fixing case netted $10.5M from Tyson for Washington consumers 2022–23: The Dept. of Labor found the contractor cleaning Tyson plants, illegally employed 100+ kids aged 13–17 on night shifts 2018: Tyson Poultry pleaded guilty to Clean Water Act violations and paid a $2M criminal fine after a discharge killed ~108,000 fish 2018–2022: Released an estimated 371M+ pounds of pollutants into U.S. waterways

Our food system is way more fragile than they want you to think

Food is one of the most powerful vehicles of change in our world. Throughout my time in college, I dug into what I was eating and the systems behind it. Freshman year: I was trapped on a dining plan, worked inside my dining hall, and viewed corporate food systems up close. I didn't think twice about what I was eating, but working inside it got my gears turning in ways I didn't yet understand. Sophomore year: I had freedom as a shopper for the first time. I did what every college kid does: Trader Joe's. Dressed-up, cheap packaged food. Junior year: I leveled up to Sprouts. Better ingredients, better values, but I started pulling the thread further. Just 4 companies control 80% of the US meat supply. 10 companies control nearly everything on the average grocery shelf. The illusion of choice is very real, and it's rooted in the same industrial system destroying our soils, our ecosystems, and our health. Senior year: I found my answer. Shopping directly from farmers. The most direct vote you can cast for healthy soil, nutrient-dense food, and thriving communities. Local, regenerative agriculture systems may not be scalable, but they are replicable — and that's the whole point. Local farmers who are feeding their communities, not the entire world at once.

Enough is enough ❌🍓

Over 99.9% of U.S. chickens raised for meat come from industrial factory farms. Inside CAFOs, birds are crowded, stressed, and bred purely for speed — not welfare. Marketing tells a different story. Stores like Sprouts have sourced private-label chicken from Tyson and Perdue. The “wholesome” label can hide a very industrial supply chain.

Reconnecting with your food means reconnecting with people

Food consolidation is reshaping America's plate. 10 companies control ~80% of grocery products—Kraft Heinz, General Mills, and Unilever among them. 4 firms (Bayer, Corteva, ChemChina, BASF) control over 60% of the global seed market. Tyson, JBS, Cargill & National Beef process 85% of U.S. beef, up from 36% in 1980. 4 retailers own a third of U.S. grocery locations. Less competition means higher prices and fewer choices.

Paper straws and reusable bags are awesome, but the best climate action we can take is saving the soil