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b'It will be hard to find Tracy Oseran\\u2019s company, Tracy\\u2019s Small-Batch Granola on social media. That\\u2019s because she focuses her media outreach through her non-profit organization, Urban Gleaners. That\\u2019s right, this double-barreled startup founder lives by the philosophy emblazed on her website: \\u201cThere\\u2019s something special about baking by hand and using organic, wholesome ingredients. There\\u2019s something even more special about making a product that gives back to the community something special.\\u201d Tracy loved to cook growing up and her cooking experiences were with her father. As she says, it would have been hard to survive on their cooking, but she and Dad had a lot of fun! She then had a catering business in Los Angeles where her popular dish was enchiladas. So popular in fact that she sold them to a grocery store chain that in turn sold them as frozen; her first venture into the food industry. Her big foray into the world of food products was rather typical for food entrepreneurs. It began in 2004 when she couldn\\u2019t find good granola in her hometown of Portland, Oregon. So, she started making her own, in small batches. And as the old story goes, family and friends couldn\\u2019t get enough of it and soon Tracy was convinced she had a commercial product. Also in 2004, Tracy met our own Sarah Masoni of Oregon State University\\u2019s Food Innovation Center and that began her catapult from kitchen to sales. She took the leap in 2006 and approached City Market in Portland. She simply asked if they\\u2019d like to sell her granola, they said, \\u201cyes\\u201d, and her first sale was made. During this same year, Tracy was driving one day listening to an NPR show about a woman saw so much good food in her community being thrown away while there were so many people going hungry. The woman began picking up the excess food and getting it to hungry people. Tracy was touched by the story and also troubled that she and her friends had plenty of good, nutritious food while so many in Portland, including children, were hungry. To make it worse, she knew of the perfectly good and delicious food that went into the garbage as waste everyday, simply because no one would make the effort to get it to the ones who needed it. She decided that she could accomplish the same thing as the woman on the radio show. And that was the beginning of Urban Gleaners, the organization that gathers, packages and distributes the useable food to those in need rather than throwing it away. COVID has been challenging because the schools have been shut down and many of the children and their families go to the schools to pick up the food. But moving some of the distribution to the parks has helped get back on track plus more schools have opened back up again. All profits from Tracy\\u2019s Small-Batch Granola go to support Urban Gleaners, and the organization runs on volunteers and donations above that. "Maybe we should just eat it."\\n\\n"Masoni and Marshall the meaningful Marketplace" with your hosts Sarah Masoni and Sarah Marshall\\n\\nWe record the "the Meaningful Marketplace" inside NedSpace in the Bigfoot Podcast Studio in beautiful downtown Portland.\\n\\nAudio engineer, mixer and podcast editor is Allon Beausoleil\\n\\nShow logo was designed by Anton Kimball of Kimball Design\\n\\nWebsite was designed by Cameron Grimes\\n\\nProduction assistant is Chelsea Lancaster\\n\\n10% of gross revenue at Startup Radio Network goes to support women entrepreneurs in developing countries thru kiva.org/lender/markgrimes'