The Earth's Best Story: A Bittersweet Tale of Twin Brothers Who Sparked an Organic Revolution »

Ron and Arnie Koss founded Earth's Best Baby Food in 1985. In addition to baby food, Ron Koss is a natural foods product innovator. During his long-term employ with the aio Food Group, Ron has secured patents for his work on complete meal supplement ice cream and has also introduced specialized complete meal supplements for people in health recovery situations. Presently, he is working on nutritional products for a global relief aid project. Ron enjoys working as a consultant for socially responsible enterprises and has a special interest in group dynamics, organizational development, and conflict resolution. He lives in Montpelier, Vermont, with his family.

Arnie Koss honed his business skills by founding and operating a number of small entrepreneurial companies in Vermont. He was actively involved in the development of organic certification standards, which eventually led to the Organic Foods Act of 1990. Arnie has served as a consultant to several prominent natural products companies and is presently the Managing Partner at aio Food Group, a Hawaii-based product development company that has created patented nutritional supplement products and also owns the Punalu'u Bakeshop and Visitor Center on the Big Island of Hawaii. He lives in Kula, Hawaii, with his family.

The Earth's Best Story tells how Ron and Arnie Koss succeeded in creating the first nationally distributed organic foods company to sit next to its mainstream competition on supermarket shelves-a step that revolutionized and empowered the organic-foods movement as a whole-and benefited hundreds of farmers as well as the millions of babies whose very first foods have been organically grown, thanks to Earth's Best.

The Koss brothers, Ron and Arnie, had been sprout growers, broommakers, tool restorers, butlers, and natural-foods clerks, yet raised millions of dollars to start the first organic baby food company in the United States. How unlikely was that?

The Earth's Best Story is a bittersweet tale about the founding of Earth's Best Baby Foods twenty-five years ago. Told through the dual narrative of each brother, this is not a business tome, although it is rich in entrepreneurial lessons and know-how. Rather, it's more like a "how to," "how not to," and "how they did it" memoir. It's personal, it's intense, it's inspirational, and it's full of reflections and tales of wonder and woe.

People of every imaginable background and station in life want to make a difference with their lives. But how do you effectively do that? How does an idea successfully journey across the wastelands separating fantasy and reality? The Koss brothers take the reader on this journey. Theirs is a tale of idealism, naivete, and possibility that reflects the quest to find a place in this world by somehow changing it for the better.

The Washington Post - Suki Casanave

A rip-roaring entrepreneurial tale, The Story of Earth's Best is packed with drama, from exploding equipment and workers drenched in apple juice to relentless financial crises and complex boardroom battles. Who knew baby food would be such treacherous terrain? Writing in a sort of back-and-forth, journal-entry format…the Koss brothers offer a candid account of their start-up venture, from the moment of inspiration to the bittersweet end.

Prologue vii

Introduction ix

Part 1 The Boys Behind the Men 1

Part 2 The Earth's Best Start-Up Begins 55

Part 3 Crossing the Finish Line but Just Beginning 141

Part 4 The Ambush 247

Part 5 Ron Is Gone 303

Part 6 The Tunnel with No Light at the End 323

Part 7 The Light 347

Part 8 Afterword 353

Acknowledgments 359

About the Authors 361