Meet Nancy Beyda

Today we’d like to introduce you to Nancy Beyda.

Hi Nancy, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
It has been almost 20 years since I first peered in to the dumpster behind a grocery store and was shocked to see the amount of food that was being thrown away. A group of my fellow yogis began picking up excess food from that store and taking it to a women’s shelter in downtown LA where the women were thrilled to receive the healthy produce and high-end prepared food that they weren’t getting before. We turned these efforts into a nonprofit in 2014 and FoodCycle has been growing by leaps and bounds since then.

When we first started I wasn’t fully aware of the environmental impact of all the food that was being tossed. In the US, it’s estimated that up to 40% of food is ending up in landfills. Our mission at FoodCycle is to make sure that food ends up in the mouths of hungry people instead. During the pandemic, food insecurity grew dramatically and that has continued to be the case now. For many families, the food we deliver makes the difference between them being able to feed their children and pay the rent. So many are struggling with the current economic situation. We keep people from falling into homelessness and play a part in addressing that crisis as well.

FoodCycle focuses on introducing innovative technology to help solve these systemic problems. We utilize electric vehicles and an app called Careit that allows people to easily volunteer to help us pick up food. We work with hundreds of businesses and deliver the food we recover to hundreds more nonprofits throughout the city. One of the greatest joys of the work we do is connecting with all the amazing communities that are feeding their neighbors.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
The pandemic led many of the larger food banks and food pantries to shut down for safety reasons. At the same time, there were major supply chain disruptions, sometimes there would be a glut of bananas that were headed for a shelter or distribution where they weren’t able to use that large quantity of food. Our model really proved itself during that crisis as we spread food throughout a network of hundreds of smaller community-based distributions that were set up in response to the great need they saw around us.

We grew more than 2000% during that time and with that level of growth, there are always challenges. We saw that our model of building a network was working and that our volunteers were able to help us step up even when more established nonprofits closed down. We threw all our resources into making sure that food didn’t go to waste while there were so many in need.

We do a lot of work that requires drivers and vehicles as well as logistics, scheduling and matching donations with the places with the most critical. Our model proved that we could send food to where it was most needed and to where it could be used immediately. Doing all that we did to help meet the increased need meant that we blew through our cash reserves quickly and are still struggling to catch up.

Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I am a long-time birth worker and midwife. I had my first baby more than thirty years ago – it was a very powerful and transformative experience that affected me deeply. I started out teaching childbirth education and then became a doula because I saw that most of the women around me weren’t having that kind of positive experience. When my children were teenagers, I went back to school to become a midwife.

I’ve been fortunate enough to have been at more than a thousand births and each one of them has been unique – and challenging! The nonprofit work that I do grows out of my commitment to help make the world a better place for these children that I am helping bring in. Climate change is the greatest crisis of our time and the one most likely to impact their lives. Wasting food that contributes to that crisis is absolutely unacceptable, especially when there are so many people who need that food.

Currently, both of my daughters are pregnant and I’m planning to be their midwife. Seeing this journey come back around full circle is such a beautiful gift!

How do you think about happiness?
Feeding people has always made me happy. I love to create connections and bring people together over a meal.

Our country has so much abundance and we are truly blessed to have enough food that sometimes we don’t appreciate the gift that we’ve been given. FoodCycle is an outgrowth of my belief in the ability of healthy food to help people and communities heal.

With my work as a midwife – seeing the look on the faces of a family when they welcome their new baby is another thrill that is hard to describe.

It’s the best feeling in the world

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.foodcyclela.org/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/foodcycle_la/?hl=en
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FoodCycleLosAngeles/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/foodcyclela/about/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHsFJN6pqthqtbhsBFHiMXQ

Image Credits
Rj Shaugnessy Valerie Defert