Mission MightyMe, the children’s food brand on a mission to help prevent food allergies with early allergen introduction, was honored by Fast Company, this week, during the announcement of its 2021 World Changing Ideas Awards, honoring the businesses, policies, projects, and concepts that are actively engaged and deeply committed to pursuing innovation when it comes to solving health and climate crises, social injustice, or economic inequality.
Named as a finalist in the Food Category, Mission MightyMe is applauded for bringing solutions to the growing epidemic of childhood food allergies. The brand offers parents a baby-friendly snack option that makes it simple to follow new peanut allergy prevention guidelines from the American Academy of Pediatrics, NIH, USDA and many others, that now recommend starting peanut foods in infancy, and consuming them regularly, to prevent peanut allergies.
The new guidelines are based on the groundbreaking 2015 LEAP (Learning Early About Peanut Allergy) Study, a five-year randomized controlled trial led by Mission MightyMe Co-Founder, Dr. Gideon Lack, that proved most peanut allergies can be prevented by regularly consuming peanut foods, starting in infancy.
A panel of eminent Fast Company editors and reporters selected winners and finalists from a pool of more than 4,000 entries across transportation, education, food, politics, technology, and more. The 2021 awards feature entries from across the globe, from Brazil to Denmark to Vietnam.
“It’s an incredible honor and privilege to be recognized by Fast Company for this award, alongside some of the most innovative brands in the world,” said JJ Jaxon, Co-Founder of Mission MightyMe. “We launched Mission MightyMe just over one year ago to help other families prevent food allergies, after this growing public health crisis impacted our own daughter. We still have a lot of work to do, but we’re thrilled and humbled to be recognized along with this remarkable group of innovators working to make the world a better place.”
Showcasing some of the world’s most inventive entrepreneurs and companies tackling global challenges, Fast Company’s Summer 2021 issue (on newsstands May 10) highlights, among others, a lifesaving bassinet; the world’s largest carbon sink, carbon-eating concrete; 3D-printed schools; an at-home COVID-19 testing kit; a mobile voting app; and the world’s cleanest milk.
“There is no question our society and planet are facing deeply troubling times. So, it’s important to recognize organizations that are using their ingenuity, impact, design, scalability, and passion to solve these problems,” says Stephanie Mehta, editor-in-chief of Fast Company. “Our journalists, under the leadership of senior editor Morgan Clendaniel, have discovered some of the most groundbreaking projects that have launched since the start of 2020.”
Indeed, the rate of nut allergies has tripled and food allergies have increased by more than 50 percent among children, since health guidelines issued in the year 2000 recommended avoiding nuts and other potential food allergens in infancy.
Those guidelines have now been overturned, but having followed the old avoidance recommendations with their first child, Catherine and JJ Jaxon, Co-founders and Co-CEO’s of MightyMe, discovered their daughter had developed a severe nut allergy by age three. When their third child was born in 2015, learning of Dr. Lack’s LEAP Study gave them hope that they could potentially prevent him from developing a food allergy like his older sister did, with early introduction and regular feeding of peanut foods and other common food allergens.
The brand’s first product, MightyMe Proactive Peanut Puffs, are quick-dissolve puffs made with simple, organic, non-GMO ingredients. Each pouch contains the precise weekly amount of peanut protein used in the LEAP Study and recommended by The American Academy of Pediatrics.
MightyMe’s Proactive Peanut Puffs were developed to age up with children as they grow, since the LEAP Study showed the importance of regularly feeding peanut foods for at least the first 5 years of life. The puffs dissolve quickly for babies and taste delicious for big kids, making them both a safe way to include peanut in infant diets, and a nutritious, clean-label snack for the whole family.
