By revamping the diets of the developmentally disabled, Jim and Sylvia Vail are saving lives — and money
In
Photo ©Callie Lipkin
America, poverty and poor nutrition often go hand in hand. That’s also true for the cash-strapped nonprofit organizations that support the developmentally disabled, say Jim and Sylvia Vail, both 1980 Kellogg graduates. Struggling under budgetary constraints, ineffective accountability measures and limited knowledge of preventive health, many social service agencies are feeding low-quality, high-caloric foods to the people they support. The obesity rate for the 6 million people with developmental disabilities is three times that of the mainstream population, and related health problems are unnecessarily costing taxpayers $4,000 per person, per year. Enter Jim and Sylvia’s brainchild Mainstay, which provides products and services to help with this dilemma. Through customized software
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and a “train the trainer” approach, Mainstay (eMainstay.com) addresses both the individual and the organization. Participating social service providers receive tailored resources to help them plan and prepare tasty, nutritious and economical meals. In fact, under Mainstay’s guidelines for healthier eating, breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks and beverages cost less than $3 per person, per day. According to Jim, organizations that use Mainstay’s products cut their food costs by 10 to 20 percent within six months. At the same time, residents become engaged in the meal process, experience an average weight loss of 10 to 15 pounds, and significantly decrease their medication usage. Providers can also track, trend and forecast health-related outcomes for the people they support, and measure their effect on funding streams, taxpayer expense and the organization’s bottom line. Based on those results, Mainstay has set a goal of helping the developmentally disabled population lose 5 million pounds within three to five years — and to help the organizations that support them save $50 million over the same period. Neither Jim nor Sylvia had a background in nutrition when they launched Mainstay as a prepared-foods delivery business in the 1990s. The couple’s motivation for starting Mainstay was entrepreneurial: They noted that there was a need for healthy, economical meals in communal homes that served the developmentally disabled. In 2000, the Vails felt compelled to redirect their efforts toward solving critical, financial and preventive health problems. They began focusing more on strategic, measurement-based initiatives for the developmentally disabled, social service agencies and the broader system. The couple was recently asked to work in conjunction with the U.S. Department of Agriculture to expand Mainstay’s impact throughout the United States. They have been instrumental in enacting legislation to mandate healthy body-mass indices for people living in group homes, and will soon meet with the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services to discuss ways to bolster the Medicaid system. While the Vails feel good about their progress thus far, they caution that there is still work to be done. “Mainstay has created a lot of positive momentum, but this is a horrendous problem that continues to be extremely costly in terms of lives and money,” Sylvia says. Adds Jim: “There’s a long way to go, but I’m glad we’ve started to make an impact — pound by pound and dollar by dollar.” — Rachel Farrell
In
March 1993, on the day that his daughter was born, John Vlahakis ’85 had an epiphany. “I realized that everything that was harming the environment would also be harming her,” Vlahakis says, sitting in his office on a balmy summer morning in Winnetka, Ill. “I felt I had to make a difference for her, to make the world a better place for her.” So Vlahakis launched Earth Friendly Products, a manufacturer of green cleaning products for home and personal use. In many respects, it was a natural transition — Vlahakis had already worked several years for his father’s company, Venus Laboratories, Inc., an industrial cleaning products manufacturer. But Earth Friendly Products’ mission was different: The company pledged to offer products that were made with natural ingredients; were safe for people, pets and the environment; and were competitive in performance, price and convenience. “I kind of created my own definition of what ‘green’ meant to me,” Vlahakis says, adding that the term wasn’t often used in 1993. “I researched chemical sensitivities and toxic ingredients, and looked at changing out formulations to create greener products. I wanted to use plant-based ingredients, move away from petrol-based ingredients, and get rid of the dyes and synthetic perfumes that people were reacting [negatively] to.” He came up with four products for home and personal use, and marketed them to independent grocery stores and natural food chains. Nearly 17 years later, Earth Friendly Products’ mission still stands — but the company has grown exponentially. It now boasts more than 60 products for bathroom, household, laundry, kitchen and pet use, with distribution across the nation as well as in the United Kingdom, Canada, South Korea, Israel, Iceland and Mexico. According to Vlahakis, Earth Friendly Products is unique among its competitors in that it does not outsource the manufacturing process; its facilities are located in Illinois, California, Florida and New Jersey. Last year’s sales topped $54 million; this year they are expected to reach $80 million. Vlahakis projects that sales for FY2010 will grow to $120 million. “The secret is distribution and finding the right price point to drive volume,” Vlahakis says. “As you become more and more established as a brand, you keep building on that.”
But Vlahakis is motivated by more than the growth of his business. He’s excited to see that his products have actually improved the health of some of his customers. “I didn’t get sick while I was cleaning [windows],” one customer wrote recently. “Thanks so much for healing those of us who react to chemicals and petro-chemicals, which seem to be in almost all the products on the market.” Wrote another: “I will never go back to other laundry detergents … This one does the job, doesn’t bother my sensitive skin or my equally sensitive nose, and doesn’t harm the environment.” Vlahakis believes the success of Earth Friendly Products is encouraging corporate America to become a greener place. “When I see companies like Clorox and SC Johnson getting into the green business, it tells me that we have risen on the radar screen,” Vlahakis says. “We’re forcing established companies that didn’t look at the environment responsibly to start paying attention.” — Rachel Farrell
Clean and green Through Earth Friendly Products, John Vlahakis takes care of the home, the planet and the bottom line Photo ©Callie Lipkin
Feeding a need
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