Michele Simon, What’s Happened to the Plant-Based Food Movement?

Michele Simon is a public health attorney, food policy expert, author, and thought leader in the plant-based foods industry. In 2016, she founded the Plant Based Foods Association (PBFA), the nation’s only membership association promoting the interests of plant-based food companies. For five years as PBFA’s executive director, Simon grew the association to over 300 members, leading a team of policy and retail experts. Through her strategic efforts, PBFA fought off the powerful meat and dairy lobbies, and forged new marketplace opportunities for the plant-based foods industry.

Simon has written extensively on the politics of food and alcohol. Her first book, Appetite for Profit: How the Food Industry Undermines Our Health and How to Fight Back, was published by Nation Books in 2006. NYU Professor Marion Nestle (who calls the book “brilliant”) made it required reading for her nutrition students. In 2010, she founded her own consulting firm, Eat Drink Politics, and has written countless articles and reports while becoming a sought-after media pundit.

Simon also offers legal advice on federal regulatory compliance for labeling and marketing, among other legal and policy services. She is admitted to practice law in California, working “of counsel” to Handel Food Law. Simon has a master’s degree in public health from Yale University and received her law degree from the University of California, Hastings College of the Law.