Green Bay, WI — Following a successful Give BIG Green Bay campaign in February, Rooted In has entered a new phase of growth, marked by several key developments that position the organization to expand its impact across the community.
Founder Selena Darrow has been named CEO, and Alex Galt has joined Rooted In as Director of Programs, strengthening leadership capacity as the organization scales its work.
As part of this momentum, Rooted In has moved into a new commercial kitchen space in Green Bay, accelerating its ability to recover surplus food, produce individually packaged meals, and strengthen partnerships that improve access to nutritious food.
For the past two and a half years, Rooted In has operated with significant constraints. Food was stored across multiple locations, and meals were prepared during monthly cooking sessions in a non-commercial kitchen, requiring extensive setup, long production days, and full breakdown after each use.
The new kitchen changes that.
“This move helps us do the work in a way that finally makes sense,” said Darrow. “We’ve been proving the model. Now we have the infrastructure and the team to scale it.”
In 2025, Rooted In recovered more than 32,000 pounds of surplus food, transforming it into over 5,500 individually packaged, nutritious meals shared across the community through key food access partners. The new space positions the organization to build on that momentum.
With a dedicated kitchen, attached storage, walk-in cooler and freezer, and transportation access, Rooted In can now operate more consistently and efficiently. Food, equipment, and packaging are centralized, allowing meals to move into the community faster and more reliably.
This shift comes at a critical time, as demand for food access in Brown County continues to rise. The community is seeing a 10% increase in need alongside a 6% drop in SNAP participation, trends that are expected to intensify as the year progresses.
Rooted In sees a clear path to expanding meal production in the near term as new food recovery partnerships and consistent kitchen operations come online. Expanded infrastructure also allows the organization to increase the volume of surplus food recovered from farms, grocery stores, manufacturers, restaurants, event venues, and other community partners.
The new space also transforms volunteer engagement. Instead of relying on a single large monthly cook, Rooted In can now offer more frequent, flexible opportunities for individuals, corporate groups, and community partners.
“We’ll be able to bring more people into the work, more often,” Darrow said. “Not just to help, but to understand the impact firsthand.”
In addition, the kitchen enables the implementation of Rooted In’s culinary education programming, grounded in a Food is Medicine approach and focused on evidence-based curriculum, practical cooking skills, nutrition, and long-term behavior change.
“These are not just cooking classes,” Darrow said. “This is about helping people nourish themselves and their families in ways that work in real life and inspire long-term behavior change.”
Rooted In will share additional details in the coming weeks about volunteer opportunities, partnerships, and ways the community can engage with the new space.
About Rooted In Inc.
Rooted In is a Green Bay–based nonprofit building a community table where all people are nourished and uplifted. Through food recovery, meal production and education, Rooted In improves access to nutritious food as a tool for transforming health and wellbeing across the community.
