Kyle Sullivan & Jesse Smith @ Figure Ate
Creating New Enterprises Supporting Ecological Stewardship
On this episode, we have Kyle Sullivan & Jesse Smith from Figure Ate Foods and the White Buffalo Land Trust. Kyle serves as the Director of Marketing and Communications while Jesse serves as the Director of Land Stewardship.
Figure Ate is supporting regenerative agriculture with their persimmon vinegar and beef biltong products, and the Figure Ate brand is a part of the larger White Buffalo Land Trust non-profit that is stewarding the 1,000-acre Jalama Canyon Ranch which serves as a global hub for regenerative land stewardship, ecological monitoring, research, education, training, and enterprise development. Figure Ate products can be found on their website and in 134 retail stores on the East and West coasts.
Starting With A Non-Profit & A 1,000-Acre Ranch
White Buffalo Land Trust was founded in 2018 and is devoted to practicing and promoting regenerative agriculture. At Jalama Canyon Ranch they run educational workshops and immersive training sessions that equip farmers, students, land managers, and policymakers with the skills to shift toward sustainable agriculture. Participants dive into methods like holistic grazing, soil-building crop rotations, and water conservation. The team on the ranch actively stewards the land and collaborates with certification bodies and academic institutes to evaluate and share the ecological outcomes of their practices.
Another key arm of White Buffalo Land Trust is its enterprise development work. The ranch partners with beef brand, Richard’s Regenerative to seasonally migrate cattle from Richard’s Ranch in Northern California to graze in Santa Barbara during the growing season. The White Buffalo team has also transitioned a five-acre vineyard at the Jalama Canyon Ranch from conventional to regenerative organic production and now collaborates with Sandhi Wines to develop and market a regenerative, natural wine.
Outside of the ranch, White Buffalo Land Trust works at the systems level, collaborating with other businesses and organizations to implement regional projects that build out broader regenerative markets and supply chains. This includes the Almond Project, which is a coalition of brands, farmers and nonprofits working to identify more sustainable almond farming methods. They also recently launched a project funded through the USDA Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities where they will collaborate with other brands to improve elderberry production, build a centralized processing facility and conduct R&D for new elderberry products to bring to market.
Creating A Food Brand Supporting Ecological Stewardship
White Buffalo Land Trust also operates Figure Ate, a food brand that brings unique regenerative products to market. The idea to start a CPG brand came from the desire to have the non-profit be an active leader in the food space and to share the mission of White Buffalo Land Trust to a wider audience through great-tasting regenerative food products.
Figure Ate also enables White Buffalo Land Trust to expand its impact supporting regenerative farming outside of its own 1,000-acre ranch. For example, the beef for their biltong is not sourced from Jalama Canyon Ranch. Sourcing from other ranchers enables Figure Ate to support the wider regenerative meat industry and scale manufacturing and distribution of their biltong more than they could if they only sourced from their property.
Figure Ate’s approach to product development is incredibly mission-driven and strategic. They center their strategy on developing products that have strong ecological benefits made from ingredients that are grown at scale, with high quality and great taste. From there they prioritize products that require minimal and efficient processing and that are relatively shelf-stable to maximize ease of storage and distribution. To date, they have focused on simple products that make it easier to share their impact story.
“How do you formulate products in service of what the land needs instead of asking the land to bend over backwards in service of your product?” – Jesse Smith
The Power of Persimmons
Figure Ate launched with an uncommon product: persimmon vinegar. Persimmon trees are very drought tolerant and water efficient, which is crucial for growing along the California coast. However, Jesse found a very limited market for the fresh fruit. Persimmon vinegar checks off many boxes on Figure Ate’s product development strategy – it markets a climate-smart crop, it requires simple, natural processing through fermentation, and it has an almost indefinite shelf life without cold storage, which simplifies the management of inventory and distribution.
“Persimmons were one of the most productive tree crops on the property. They used the same amount of water per acre in a year as the avocado did in a week. They had very little in the way of pests and they're just this amazing sweet, nutritious superfood.” – Jesse
Supporting regenerative persimmon production advances White Buffalo Land Trust’s mission to re-perennialize landscapes while also elevating the value of underused, nutrient-rich crops.
Spicing Up Biltong
Figure Ate’s second product is beef biltong, a high-quality, dried meat snack made from regeneratively raised beef. Biltong, a traditional South African product, involves air-drying meat with minimal ingredients, resulting in a nutrient-dense, healthy snack with a long shelf life. They currently have two SKUs of biltong: original and spiced. Both are marinated in Figure Ate’s persimmon vinegar.
Figure Ate sources beef from certified American Grassfed® and Land To Market™ ranches.
They began their sourcing journey with White Oak Pastures and as demand grew, now partner with Thousand Hills Lifetime Grazed. This approach supports a network of regenerative ranchers dedicated to restoring ecosystems through holistic grazing practices.
Figuring out optimal package messaging has been a journey for Figure Ate. They have learned that unlike selling at their ranch or at a farmers market, in retail stores, they need to find the quickest and simplest way to communicate and build trust with the consumer. For Figure Ate, that’s where third-party certifications really help.
“If your product is sitting on a shelf, 3,000 miles away and someone's just breezing by it, you need someone to speak on your behalf, and that's what third-party certifications do.” – Jesse
The team also spent significant time identifying which nutritional benchmarks resonate most with consumers, such as protein and sugar content. They have also added a QR code to their pack that takes the consumer to the website where they can learn more about Figure Ate’s mission and sourcing principles.
50% Market Share for Regen
Jesse believes that reaching 50% market share requires a multi-pronged approach that includes consumer engagement, policy shifts, and targeted investment. He sees health-conscious consumers as a key catalyst, with growing health technology increasingly enabling individuals to instantly understand how what they eat impacts their bodies. He also advocates for increased funding from governments, foundations, and private investors to fund land stewardship and build up small-scale processing facilities across the US.
Kyle thinks brands must continue to exploit all three benefits of regenerative products: superior taste, nutritional benefits, and ecological impact. He highlights how consumers have different priorities and that highlighting multiple benefits provides an entry point for all.
This ReGen Recap was written by Katey Finnegan
You can check out the full episode with Kyle Sullivan & Jesse Smith HERE
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