BuyKind.com is a website that allows you to buy fully prepared meals from restaurants all over the country and have them shipped right to your door. Jody Kivlin, one of the founders of BuyKind, came to this vegan business through an interesting and heart-wrenching journey of her own. She spoke to Vegan Mainstream recently from a hill in Wisconsin, surrounded by her goats, about this journey, and her business, which allows her to live kindly, and share veganism with others.
Vegan Mainstream: Can you describe what BuyKind.com is, and how it works, for people who have never visited the site?
Jody: BuyKind is about enjoying and sharing ‘the taste of kindness’. It is an amazing opportunity to experience the best food in the world – vegan done right and we deliver.
We search out the best of the best and at the simple click of a mouse, you can order fresh, mouth-watering exquisite creations from the best gourmet vegan restaurants, chefs and bakeries shipped right to the door.
You can order for one or for many – appetizers, entrees, desserts – full course menus. It takes just a little simple prep and you’re ready for unsurpassed mouthwatering epicurean splendor, the best food in the world – cruelty-free of course! In the comfort of your own home, with the candles lit, in front of the fireplace wherever you’d like, buykind is about helping you to enjoy one of the best dining experiences of your life!
We also want to help people be more healthy, and to be available to those who want to eat less meat. We have meal plans, and have served a variety of people, from event planners, people getting married, grandparents who want to send healthier food to their college-age children, mothers of children with allergies, and people who travel or work long hours who need help getting good food.
VM: What inspired you to start buykind.com?
J: I want people to know how good vegan food can be. I want this to be something that arrives and they are just blown away. So it clicks: the simple choice of kindness equals the best things in life! It is 100% completely from my heart, from waking up, from my most amazing, sweetest little goats – surrounding me now – who are the reason I woke up.
It all started with the excerpt of the story on the mission page of my website: www.buykind.com/mission.html – because of, in honor of my Zorro and Buffalo and Chocolat and Shantee and Zing Zing and Gizelley-Belle, my teachers and loves, my rescued, adopted little (big) goats and all of the others, Henry, Harry and Gracey, Thomison, Billy Braveheart, Flower and her beautiful little calf… the list goes on and on. The enormity of their gift to me, the suffering I saw some of them endure inflicted at the hands of small family farms is… beyond words to describe. I realized the most important thing I could do with my time on this earth is to help end the worst, most insane cruelty this world has known, endured by animals at the hand of humans, mainly farm animals.
VM: How do you find restaurants or food providers?
J: Lots of great research and testing!!! We also have the buykind store which features an exclusive selection of amazing compliments for any dinner party – vegan wines, chocolates, “cowches” by Helga — omigosh, you have to check out the cowches! All we find through the process of searching out the best of the best.
VM: How does testing work?
J: I work so hard sometimes!! After learning of an amazing possibility for buykind – someplace getting incredible rave reviews, I contact the owner and chef. They’ve been so great and yup, several think this is crazy – but willing to give it a try! So we discuss what might work and we do a test ship or two (I set them up with our shipping materials which, by the way we’ve chosen because it is biodegradable and non-toxic!).
I’ll never forget the Sublime test menu – I put the fork down after the first bite and — almost cried. It was like watching Nureyev or Baryshnikov perform Swan Lake on the Paris Opera stage – the best thing I’ve ever eaten — such a tough job sometimes! Everything we choose for buykind, we love!! That’s how the test is aced.
VM: What obstacles have you come across running a vegan business?
J: Oh my gosh! Do you have about a month to hear the stories (at which I am hoping someday to be able to laugh!)? Starting a new business [is difficult enough], and then for the new business to be something like BuyKind, which has never been done before to my knowledge… it was trail blazing without a map and with many, many, many challenges. Because the root of BuyKind is founded in love, despite all of the many challenges, there is an abundance, an overflow of joy and energy to overcome and continue this effort to create something worthwhile and beautiful.
I am also fortified to continue because of our wonderful customers and the rave responses from our customers who most often order again and again and say the nicest things! AND so, so, so great, I am hearing that the vegans that ordered are sharing this food with the non-vegan’s out there and getting feedback that it is the best food ever! [Which leads to], of course, my hope from here – [that they will] transition to veganism!
At present, we are still waiting for…our shopping cart to be completed…Thanks to buykind supporters, for your patience as we try to make this happen as quickly as possible. Some of the carts are done and orders can always be phoned or emailed in. – and they are GREATLY appreciated.
VM: What do you find most rewarding about running buykind.com?
J: Helping animals. Seeing that people are being introduced to the total joy of eating vegan. It is so inspirational and fun to talk to our customers. Since going vegan, since waking up, I have clarity of purpose – which is priceless. I know my time is valuable if it means that I can help bring joy to one of the sweet creatures of this earth. I and friends who are vegan, are now healthier than ever and I’m told I look way younger than I am. It is so rewarding to be able to open this up for others.
BuyKind exists to help create a kinder more beautiful, more delicious world for ALL creatures great and small, and the reward is when I feel we are accomplishing this! We want as many people as possible to experience the best food in the world – vegan food, free of cruelty and suffering.
Also, it is so rewarding to help these incredible creative vegan talents and trailblazing chefs with dollars from BuyKind to help them succeed and grow! My modest goal with BuyKind is to feed the whole world, make the world… vegan!
VM: Do you think it’s important for vegans to bring their lifestyle into their work – and if so, can you talk about why?
J: I think it’s crucial. For me, it’s on the mission page. It was like leaping off a cliff – without hesitation after what I learned and saw first-hand – the cruelty that these animals have to endure. I think one of the most important things you can do is use every opportunity to make things better. For me, it’s kind of like a game. Every chance I get – not just work (which I wholeheartedly think you should bring your whole self into) – but each encounter I am wondering. It is because I think at some level, I realize that… that tiny isolated veal calf is tied on a rope so short he is unable to lie down or nuzzle his neighbor, or a mother cow and baby are being torn from each other… It goes on and on, the cruelty that must stop, and so I have to fight every chance I get. And that means I am wondering how [to make that happen], at every encounter. Just a few sentences, if that is all the circumstance allows, are like a seed planted.
One thing that’s come to me lately is to thank the store I’m at for the vegan selection [they have]. And [that often creates an opportunity to talk to them about veganism and encourage them to do their research and find out the benefits.] I think it’s important to put oneself into the shoes of the person you’re talking to – how would you [have best received] the message before you’d woken up to the whole thing? I think it’s essential to be respectful with the assumption that people have a good, great heart, just waiting to do something to make a better world – but they just don’t know and can’t even imagine the cruelty – because it’s true! Often I think as people start to learn how horrible it is, it seems too big to tackle, so resignation can kick in. That’s why it’s important I think, to offer a some action, a small step, one meal, one bite – how do you climb Mount Everest?
VM: Can you talk about how you think technology and the Internet has impacted veganism (is it easier these days?)
J: For the better! It’s really important for the truth to be so easily accessible – like a quick mention to people to go to Farm Sanctuary’s website, or Google ‘From Farm to Fridge’, a 12-minute documentary by Mercy for Animals. I love Biz Stone, founder of Twitter who became vegan after a visit to Farm Sanctuary – and [there are many] other smart, successful entrepreneurs [who are vegan too]. BuyKind exists today because of the internet.
VM: What’s your best selling item (and why do you think it is so popular)?
J: Cake! People know to look for cakes online – plus the pictures are SO yummy. You have to take a look at the buykind dessert page! www.buykind.com/vegancakes.html. People know to look for cakes, but don’t realize that they can [also] have basically, nationwide carryout from the best restaurants in the world – shipped right to the door! It is such a novel and amazing concept. The biggest challenge is explaining it, and [making them realize] that it can be affordable. We have several restaurants with moderate prices (the Vegetable Garden entrees are about $10 each and are huge – normally about 2 to 3 servings per entrée). We also have incredible high-end gourmet expensive restaurants – worth the splurge every once in a while, or more if you can afford it. Shipping also can be about the same price as one would pay for gas and tip when dining out – so it definitely can be affordable.
My goal is to offer the whole range of foods, from down-home comfort food to Fusion, Italian, French, Asian to high-end gourmet. I aim to have the vegan version of foods one may be craving from pre-vegan days - the KIND, healthier and more delicious version, as well as introducing unique and novel plant-based creations which stand alone.
VM: Is there anything else you’d like to share?
J: I’ve been asked ‘what would you recommend to others thinking of going vegan or who want to start an ethical business promoting vegetarianism? My answer is: come from heart, from love – this being the source of inexhaustible creativity and energy. Dream big. Though climbing a mountain, focus on the perfection of the single step at hand, without compromise. Be aware and flexible, some of the most amazing gifts come from what was not planned (by us). Never surrender.
And…Come visit us – at buykind.com! It is about pure delicious joy. When you order from BuyKind, you not only experience the best food in the world, but you are helping to make a better world. You are helping to defeat cruelty with joy, by eating the best food, by choosing kindness for your plate.
