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Research and Justice For All is a podcast from Health Affairs that provides perspectives on how to dismantle unjust systems and structures that have long impacted health outcomes in historically marginalized populations. Hear how to challenge injustices in health care – rooted in racism, sexism, ableism, and other forms of exclusion – through research, evidence, community-building, and other potential and innovative solutions.
Each season of the podcast is sponsored by organizations dedicated to eliminating health inequities.
This is Research and Justice for All, season 2. I'm your host, Rhea Boyd. This season, we're exploring the social, economic, and political conditions that shape health and well-being. To do that, we're talking to local experts, founders of community based organizations that intimately understand the adverse impacts of inequality and discrimination, and how they affect health. Through their work, they're undertaking powerful efforts to address those adverse impacts in cities across the US.
Rhea Boyd:And if you like what you hear, click subscribe, so you can listen to future episodes. Today, we're gonna be talking about food insecurity. According to the Urban Institute's 2022 Well-being and Basic Needs survey that they did between December of 2021 December of 2022, nearly 1 in 4 or 24.6 percent of Americans don't know where their next meal is coming from. So we're grateful to be joined today by Dion Dawson. Dion is a food fighting social entrepreneur, philanthropic leader, and the founder and chief dreamer at Dion's Chicago dream.
Rhea Boyd:Dion, welcome to the pod.
Dion Dawson:Thanks for having me.
Rhea Boyd:So this is a huge problem. It's a nationwide problem, and you're tackling it in Chicago. First, just tell us a little bit more about yourself, and then tell us more about what Dion's Chicago dream does.
Dion Dawson:Well, I mean, I'm a fairly, fairly simple guy now. Husband, father, navy veteran, Chicago born and raised, Southside. If you're from Chicago, then you know it's the big, beef between South and Westside. So, you know, I have to say the Southside is better. And I am the the chief dreamer and founder of Dion Chicago Dream, and, you know, Dion Chicago Dream is not really, you know, one thing.
Dion Dawson:I think that, you know, in our 4 years since we've been founded, you know, it we I've become a forever learner, and, you know, we've really been continuing to evolve into, you know, ultimately what's needed to meet our objective, which is to just, you know, address food insecurity, in ways that bring consistency and quality, that has been lacked in the past. And, you know, it looks and feels as fresh as it should for something that wasn't created in the 19 forties, but in 2020. So just trying to bring, you know, some new energy, new approaches, and innovations to the game.
Rhea Boyd:So tell us more about Dion Chicago Dream. What does your organization do?
Dion Dawson:We fight food insecurity, through last mile delivery and logistics. And so, you know, we've focused on creating a new organization that, you know, can directly provide a week's worth of brand new fruits and vegetables, directly to households, all over, Cook County in Illinois, which is, you know, the 2nd largest county in America. And we do it through, you know, 3 different food intervention programs. We have that one community fridge, project dream fridge. We have, dream deliveries, and then we also have our dream vault, which is our network enabled locker system where we can, place a locker system, enroll up to a 175 households, and then, have them pick it up inside of a different location, you know, being able to be patrons and businesses in their neighborhood.
Dion Dawson:So, I mean, yeah, that's kinda that's that's kinda what we do.
Rhea Boyd:So Dion's dream is, like, a unique approach to food insecurity. I think when a lot of people think about interventions for food insecurity, the first model that might pop in their mind is the food pantry. In health care settings, we've even embedded food pantries where people can, you know, go to the 1st floor of a hospital or clinic and walk out with a bag of groceries. Tell us how your model's different and why you rejected that typical food bank model that accepts donated, unsold food and kinda keeps food from going to waste.
Dion Dawson:Well, I think that when we talk about food insecurity, everyone, you know, because of messaging and because of fear mongering, approaches it from, preventing food waste approach. And so if we go from that approach, I can understand why we land at the pantry model. But if we don't and we actually talk about, you know, the the food that's out there that's not going, going bad and expired and not selling, then we have to, you know, look at what barriers are in place to prevent people from it. So for DS Chicago Dream, our 2 main, differentiators is that number 1, we don't take any donated food, so the £1,500,000 of fresh produce that we provided in the last 4 years, every single piece of produce has been purchased, packed, and delivered by Dionne Chicago Dream, and we've never registered a single volunteer hour. All of our labor has been paid, and as a result, we've created 30 5 wage paying positions that pay at least $20 an hour.
Dion Dawson:And those 2 differentiators alone allow us to to stand out, but also be held accountable because those are 2 things that, you know, we're damn proud of. And we wanna make sure that, you know, we we we hold them close.
Rhea Boyd:Okay. So it sounds like you guys have a delivery based model that you employ all of the folks who work on your service line and that you are delivering an incredible amount of food. I mean, 1,500,000 over 4 years of fresh produce is a massive amount of food.
Dion Dawson:Yes.
Rhea Boyd:So just so people get a sense of kind of every aspect of what Dion's Chicago Dream does, tell us from start to finish how food goes from the supplier to someone's doorstep through Dion's Chicago Dream.
Dion Dawson:You know, just looking at, you know, Dion's Chicago Dream as a whole, you know, we're a social enterprise that's really focused on, you know, centering health equity, and we do that through our 35 team members. And, you know, they're break they're broken down into basically 3 main teams. So you have your build team, which is in charge of receiving the food that that we purchase. So we procure, the food from, the the regional food brokers and suppliers, and the build team is in charge of receiving our food, prepping our food, breaking it down, and then building our our boxes, and then they store them. And then from there, we have our delivery crews which come in every day at, between 3 and 4 AM.
Dion Dawson:They have their route dispatched to them, and then from there, they they get their boxes, and then, you know, they're off to the races, and they're they're delivering, all over the county. And then we have our last team, which is extremely important to what we're doing, which is our internal team of community health workers who are tasked with doing a biweekly touch point with every single household that we're serving, collecting perception based data around 6 different areas that culminate in our dream score. So we know we're judged on ease of delivery, quality of produce, stress after delivery, things of that nature, and our dream score on a scale of 1 to 10, right now is a 9.88 and has never dipped below a 9.5. And even in our quantitative data collection, we've seen that our deliveries have lowers are lowering stress levels by more than 81% right now, and that's pretty much it. We're, you know, we're logistics, and we're last mile delivery to the tune of serving more than 2,000 households in a 118 ZIP codes every single week.
Rhea Boyd:Woah. I mean, that is a huge operation, not even in terms of staff, also in terms of clients that you serve.
Dion Dawson:Absolutely.
Rhea Boyd:I wanna drill more into a bit of these teams because I love that this model is a delivery based model. Like, you know, during the pandemic, I think we all have become much more familiar with food delivery services that you access through apps. Like, it's how a lot of people, right, get anything from dinner 1 night to your groceries for the whole week. But it's not how people usually think of serving folks who might be homeless or unhoused or insecurely housed or facing all of the stresses of financial insecurity and poverty. And so tell us why did you start with the delivery model?
Rhea Boyd:Did you say at the very beginning, you know, we need to deliver these groceries to folks? Or tell us how you landed on or why you landed on delivery as the model because I think it's it's fascinating. And for the other people who get delivery services, it's expensive.
Dion Dawson:Of course.
Rhea Boyd:You know, you can't DoorDash your coffee every morning. It's super expensive. So how did you land on that delivery model?
Dion Dawson:So when we started the On Chicago Dream, we actually started with a community fridge, one community fridge called Project Dream Fridge that was located and is located. We still have it till this day. We just never scaled it to more fridges, but we have that community fridge outside of a liquor store on the south side of Chicago in Inglewood, and it was there stocking it every day that we really learned who we were, and we learned about the core tenets of what we would become. When we think about, you know, having, you know, the ability to listen to feedback, it was at the fridge every day after I stocked it with fresh fruits, vegetables, and water that when they would reach in, I would hear them say, oh, man. I wish I had had pineapple.
Dion Dawson:You know what I mean? Or things like that. And and so, you know, you learn about serving people and making sure that you're exposed enough to really get the real experience. And so starting with that fridge, I learned, you know, one of the most important things which was, you know, having the consistency that's needed to run a business. Every day, no matter what, committing, saying that we're gonna be there and actually being there.
Dion Dawson:And then when we actually, you know, there was a building that was available in Inglewood, and we actually applied for it. We had enough money, the land bank had it, and we didn't get it. And I'll never forget, I was talking to, you know, one of my one of my closest friends from the military. I was crying on the phone, and, you know, I was like, we didn't get it. And she said something that she didn't even understand was so profound.
Dion Dawson:She said, it does not matter if you would have gotten the building because you still would have been the leader of your organization the next day. And it was then that I realized that, you know, I have to run this like like like we're going to be here, and I'd run it like I'm glad we're here. And so from there, I said, okay. If the world is shut down, and this is 2020, the end of 2020, and, you know, we didn't get the building, then we have to do direct to consumer. It's it's it's inevitable.
Dion Dawson:And so, you know, I credit, you know, not only the people that we're serving, but those people around me who protected me long enough to just listen to all of the lessons that I was supposed to learn because knowing when when you have to accept that something is not working as well as it could be allows you to better the product or program. And as a result, you know, I said, okay, we have to go direct to consumer and we have to deliver. And in doing that, we started with delivery with only 15 households on 2 different blocks in Inglewood, but we we started learning immediately that first delivery day and that second delivery day the next week all of the ins and outs of last mile delivery and all the ins and outs of building a team and all of the ins and outs of, you know, exposing yourself to public opinion. And and and even though you're not charging the recipients, treating them, you know, like the customers and clients that they are and making sure that we're held accountable to that quality and consistency. And as a result, we've been able to scale since then.
Rhea Boyd:I mean, let's talk about that. You guys really do treat all of your clients like customers who maybe are paying into it. And part of that is this way that you survey folks. Right? Like, almost you mentioned your 3rd team does that almost every 2 weeks.
Rhea Boyd:You asked about the quality of the food and their experience. Tell us why that was an important part of the model because that doesn't always exist. You know, you go to the food pantry and you take what's there. And a lot of the programs for folks who have a basic need are kind of like just accept what is, take what's been donated, instead of asking people, is this really what you want? Do you want it a different way?
Rhea Boyd:Tell us why that service is an important part of your model.
Dion Dawson:Well, I think it's important because I I think that access to our communities have been co opted, and it's been sold, to the lowest bidder. And, you know, when we think about a lot of the the data tracks, the census tracks, and all of the data, and all of the the the the core data that anchors funding, you know, at the neighborhood level and above, most of them are anchored by data from our communities. But here's the funny part. I don't just look at what's on the paper. I think whenever you become a professional and you start to, you know, want to be viewed as an expert, you also look at what's not there.
Dion Dawson:And what I what I become well, what I became fixated on was metrics of success. And when we think about this, you know, it's one thing to say, hey, we're this. But how were you holding yourself accountable to be this? And how do you know you're being successful? And I think that, you know, when you talk about that service, if we're serving these people, how are we making sure that we serve them the right way?
Dion Dawson:And there's no other way around it other than talking to them and getting their perspective and their insight and making sure we're doing it with a steady cadence so they can see that through the bad or good that we're gonna be there. And as a result, having that consistency allows us to continue to focus on our product and our program, that which is what we are. Dion Chicago Dream, is a a product. And if we want the best product out there, we have to make sure that we're getting that feedback from the people that we're serving in a way that's respectful, consistent, and that allows us to be the best at whatever we're trying to be.
Rhea Boyd:I mean, I really love that. Earlier, you mentioned that, you know, you grew up, housing insecure, unhoused for periods, and food insecure yourself. How has that shaped I have to imagine that an approach that is so respectful, that is so convenient, that is like what people get through a private service had to have in some way been shaped by your personal experience. Like, is that true? Do you do
Dion Dawson:you draw from your experience? I'm I'm I'm the the luckiest guy in the world because I get to do something so amazing like this, and I and I was able to make it and still be in my right mind. And when we, you know, when we think about the mental toll that being food insecure, and then you add the multiplier of housing insecure, single mother household separated from my brothers, and then even adding on to that, being a disabled veteran, coming back from the Navy, and I was one of the top rated journalists in all the armed forces, won Navy wide and DOD wide awards, and couldn't get a job. I couldn't get a job at Walmart and as a greeter, and was living in my car going to DePaul until I had to leave because you couldn't convince me being homeless and living in my car that I had to care about a math class. You know what I mean?
Dion Dawson:To make it all the way here and be able to do what I was put on this earth to do because I've always felt special, and to be able to do this and make people's life better and and do it in a way that's culturally comforting to to to my soul. It's just no one can take that away from me. It shaped everything of who I am, and I just feel so lucky. You You know what I mean? I remember all of those days.
Dion Dawson:I remember the days of being separated from my mom, my brothers, not eating. You know what I mean? Like, I I remember those days, but to to make it to this day, you know, and and still have a joy and and a happiness that that I can get from the life that I'm living. You know, I I I'm real I feel I feel really lucky and honored because it doesn't always end like that for so many people.
Rhea Boyd:I mean, that's such a powerful reflection when you said, you know, how grateful you are to have made it and still be in your right mind. I mean, I just have to sit with that for a second because I feel like, like you're saying, there is a mental toll that comes with not having your basic, basic needs met and then the ways that trying to get those needs met can also displace and separate families.
Dion Dawson:And there's a lack of there's a lack of focus on happiness. When you're when you're living reactively, you you you never focus on being happy. You know what I mean? And I think that, you know, I I I couldn't I I I can't remember a time when I could sit down and my mom could just tell me, hey. Don't don't focus on the money.
Dion Dawson:Just be happy. You know what I mean? And and what that could have done for me. You know what I mean? I think I I think about, you know, so my mom wanted to do so much.
Dion Dawson:You know what I mean? And and for for me to be able to to do this, not only for for everybody else, but for myself. You know what I mean? I I really fell in love with loving me for me and just trying to be the best version of myself that I could be. And so being in your right mind is is is accepting, you know, yourself for who you are and being able to love yourself, and and that's something that is, you know, extremely difficult, not only as a founder or a community leader, but also as a man, a black man, a father, a husband, and and having all of these things converge and and still try to keep everything on track while you're pulling off something that is is rarely done in philanthropy or business.
Rhea Boyd:Absolutely. And that point about, like, access to happiness is so I think everybody can understand that. Is this why you say that we should treat healthy food as a human right?
Dion Dawson:Absolutely. Absolutely. I I I think that, you know, a quote that I love is entrepreneurs are are judged, off of their execution, And social entrepreneurs are judged off their intent. So whenever we talk about non profits and non profit leaders, we say, oh, they do good work. You know, you, oh, they do good work.
Dion Dawson:But I think that we're at a point where I just wanna add a splash of being judged off execution. You know what I mean? Because I think that, you know, that accountability and and and treating food like a human right and understanding that, you know, which is why, you know, at Dion's Chicago Dream, we don't say we're trying to solve hunger. It is impossible. We just lost, you know, 2 decades' worth of of of gains in 4 years, and we were no closer then.
Dion Dawson:You know what I mean? And so it's really about positioning and and communicating, you know, the truth about, you know, what we're going through and understanding that, you know, our our recipients, you know, everyone on earth, they deserve consistency, and we can't ignore it just to try to make sure that we can extract value from them. We have to acknowledge that if we're not providing that consistency, we have to have a honest dialogue with them about why we aren't. And, you know, it's just about being able to wake up and look people in their eye and tell the truth. You know, if we treat it like a human right and we acknowledge that human right and we know that consistency is quality, consistency and quality is needed, and we talk about it and we be about it, I mean, it's just so much easier to live with yourself.
Rhea Boyd:I just wanna dive into one of those statistics you just shared, that we lost 2 decades of gains in 4 years. Are you tell us what you're referring to there. Is it about the pandemic supports that were rolled back and cut? Is it about the expanded work requirements for people receiving food assistance? How did we lose these gains?
Dion Dawson:I mean, it's all it's all of it. You know what I mean? And and I think the biggest thing is that when you look back in 2020, we didn't have a food problem. We had a food distribution problem. If the world shut down, how can we continue to serve those people that we're supposed to serve?
Dion Dawson:And, you know, we we could come up with a a laundry list of things that have impacted, you know, being being able to make sure that people's basic needs are met. But I think that, you know, if we were no closer, let's just, you know, just for let's just say we were 30% there to solving hunger before the pandemic, right? What percentage will we give ourselves today knowing that we lost so much and the veil was lifted? You know what I mean? Knowing that, you know, we weren't ready for the world to shut down.
Dion Dawson:You know what I mean? It really exposed our lack of infrastructure, our lack of emergency preparedness, our lack of evolving models that can get to people at the drop of a dime. And with that, it's not like I'm not taking responsibility, I have to. It's not to say that Dion's Chicago dream is doing great work and everybody else sucks. No.
Dion Dawson:I we're in this game, we're failing people, and we have to do better. You know what I mean? And I think that that that stark reminder every day allows that edge to stay there. We didn't we didn't win anything. You know what I mean?
Dion Dawson:We've you know, we're there, but we still have to have more widespread application. We have to have more people being able you know, if they're, you know, transient and they're they're they're right on the fringes of of, you know, lower class and middle class. If they lose their job, will we still be able to get to them? Will we still be able to contact them? Will we still be able to serve them?
Dion Dawson:And so it's just really about, you know, knowing that we have a long ways to go of really building out that network and that infrastructure to meet people where they are, to meet their critical needs, and then provide social services.
Rhea Boyd:Yeah. You're touching on a larger point. I want us to talk just a smidge more about because I think there's something kind of fundamentally depraved about a wealthy nation that lets people go hungry. You know, kids go hungry. Families go hungry night after night.
Rhea Boyd:And as you just said, we don't have a food problem in the United States. We have a food distribution problem. You touched on this in a blog you wrote in February, where you said, there's more than enough food to feed everyone in the US, but the food distribution system is built for profit, not people.
Dion Dawson:Yes.
Rhea Boyd:Tell us more about that.
Dion Dawson:The the the the problem with the food distribution model is that last mile delivery is expensive to scale, but once you get there, it'll it'll be able to level out, you know, cost and and acquisition, the the acquisition cost and and the model will will will kinda balance out. And so when we talk about food distribution now, if it's stopping short of getting to the home of the person who needs it, then it's not built for the person. You know what I mean? And I think that we see that in the stark contrast of philanthropic food distribution versus for profit food distribution. But I always love to throw that against, the the the metric of, year over year national giving only moves a fraction of a percent.
Dion Dawson:So the same resources and money is there, but if all of that is poured into infrastructure and lack of job creation year in and year out, we'll never actually build that infrastructure that food distribution needs. You know what I mean? I tell people all the time, if you look at the food distribution and the food pantry model, let's say any organization, if they employ a pantry model, if they are a 5, let's say a $50,000,000 organization, right, if they only have 5 employees, then a bulk of that money never makes its way back to the communities, the black and brown communities who are missing out by way of salary dollars. And if they aren't procuring in said neighborhoods, then money is not being spent in those neighborhoods and no Then the money is not going to those neighborhoods by way of contracting and procurement. And so you have a situation where a $50,000,000 organization has not been able to be, have a value add to all of these communities that they say they want they want to help.
Dion Dawson:And so, you know, like like, when we when when we think about it and start zooming out, you know, you're talking about, you know, mid level, upper management, c suite positions that never make it to our communities, so they can't buy homes. And property, there's no, revenue for our schools from the property taxes, and now we're starting to bleed into education, and that, like, it creates this whole mess of a situation, and I try to zoom in just enough to make sure that we keep that edge, and I try to zoom out just enough so that we can hold ourselves accountable in areas that we can make a change, and I I just know that with food distribution a bulk of the money and revenue that is coming into a lot of the food distribution orgs, a lot of the big ones, none of that money ever touches the black and brown communities who need it most. And I'm not saying that from, hey, I'm judging your, intent type of perspective. It's a hey, I'm judging your execution perspective.
Rhea Boyd:Oh, we gotta get into this for a second. We have to get into this. Because first, what you're mentioning is now about more than food. It's about this applies to anybody who has, like you said, social entrepreneur, anybody who's working at a nonprofit that's directly serving clients, trying to meet their basic needs. And there is this, I think, more recent frame that says folks with lived experience should be involved in the process to have their own needs met.
Rhea Boyd:And the most common way I think they folks are incorporated is as some type of adviser. It's like Yep. We now have a community advisory council, which is mostly volunteer. And you just help us understand what we should be doing, and you helped us build this model, and we say we cobilt it. But most of the budget of these organizations don't actually employ and pay for
Dion Dawson:Exactly.
Rhea Boyd:Community.
Dion Dawson:Exactly.
Rhea Boyd:And so I wanna I wanna just say, Steve, what you're saying is, and I want you to just put a big period and maybe exclamation point on this for all the listeners, that, like, you're also saying, like, the business of nonprofits now have to not just take the perspective of the community, but you have to include the community in the business from supply to actual delivery of services. Is that what you're saying?
Dion Dawson:Absolutely. You have we have to be intentional about every single, decision that we make and be able to live with results. But in philanthropy, we want to fail as a result, and then we want people to judge us off our intent. And I say to that, no more.
Rhea Boyd:Absolutely. And I feel like the other implication is that this is how structural racism persists. Right? This is how communities become persistently cut out of the value created by these organizations. Like and the communities that are cut are not cut evenly across the US population.
Rhea Boyd:It's the same Black and Brown communities that have been divested in, that have had money taken from them, that have had their land taken from them, that have had resources stripped from them, that don't have access to the same opportunities and jobs. And then even the organizations that come to serve them say, but we can only serve you if we give you something for free that you come pick up and you take what is. And you guys just have such a profoundly different model where you're also employing people, where you're also procuring some of the food from the communities who are most affected. I mean, wow.
Dion Dawson:But also, let's let's let's let's do a let's do a little exercise to to kinda illuminate or or bring this home. You are in the Bay Area, and, you know, this is a byproduct of all of that, what we just spoke about. But I I I know nothing about the Bay Area. I know nothing about the positions that are available. But let's let's let's have a little fun, right?
Dion Dawson:Because what you're gonna see in all of these cities is if we don't create the jobs and we don't procure and contract from these communities, why do you think that whenever there is a job opening for companies and organizations that have revenue from 10 to 50,000,000 and above, why black and brown leaders are never considered? Because the first thing that you they say is that we've never ran anything that had 10,000,000 in revenue or 5,000,000 in revenue. But how can we if the very industries don't create the job or the pipeline to the job? You're I mean, listen, in in Chicago, we have affluent, affluent academic institutions that are offering nonprofit leadership as a major and as a focus in schools that black students historically can't even get in. And so when you're talking about structurally, it's the non profit industrial complex has been at every level and is right in our face, but we're judging intent and we're not seeing that, you know, if if Dion did not boldly proclaim that we were gonna be an institution that brings in diversified revenue, that in 4 years has gone from $0 to being a $5,000,000 organization that's debt free, then I would not ever be considered to run anything that has revenue for 10,000,000.
Dion Dawson:Even though, as quiet as it's kept, we tripled, our revenue year over year since inception. When we think about these things, you know, it's not just the food, but it's also, you know, what talented CEOs and c suite positions are have someone coming from these communities that that that are a shoe in for the position and if they get the shot to interview. All of these search firms in every city, executive search firms, they're looking for for candidates, and I'm not talking about whether or not they're doing it, efficiently or not, But they have these platforms, where they're looking for people to fill them in. It's like, if we don't ever, you know, change how we're viewed and really, you know, create these jobs and create these pipelines and create these careers, then what are we really doing? But if I'm wrong in Oakland, you know, or right outside of Oakland is different, let me know.
Dion Dawson:But I'm starting to see a little trend where, you know, as musical chairs, when we have a position that opens up and then this CEO goes to there, You know what I mean? Just some of these things that make you go,
Rhea Boyd:Oh, you're preaching a word today. I mean, I I a 100% know what you mean. Essentially, what you're saying is the nonprofit industrial complex functions in this way exactly like for profit structures, just like that example you gave about, you know, the Chipotle CEO and Starbucks, that by through the systematic exclusion of black folks, other communities of color and other likely marginalized groups, women, disabled folks, that they create the lack of experience
Dion Dawson:Absolutely.
Rhea Boyd:That then they use as an excuse to continue your exclusion.
Dion Dawson:Exactly.
Rhea Boyd:And that is just textbook structural racism. And we usually think of the relationship between structural racism and other capitalist structures that you exclude people because you only want certain people to profit. You can only have a small minority of people profit. That's, like, how capitalism works. But here, we're looking at the nonprofit sector.
Dion Dawson:This is
Rhea Boyd:not supposed to be a capitalist enterprise, and it's functioning the same way. I mean, do you have some thoughts as to why that is? Is it because capitalism is just I mean, it's our political economy, and it's just so powerful that it pervades the way you think about like, Americans think about any intervention? Or why is that? Why can't nonprofits get out of this?
Dion Dawson:Well, I think that, you know, capitalism is, you know, is is is in the eye of the beholder. You know what I mean? I think that, you know, the the person in the driver's seat or what I like to say is, you know, the dollar, the hand where the dollar lands is ultimately the decider. And I just think that, you know, that accountability and that integrity that we've had to had at Dion's Chicago Dream has allowed us to remember why we're doing this and hold ourselves true to that. And so, you know, it's it's not to say, hey, capitalism is bad, but it's more to say that, you know, capitalism uninterrupted, you know, with no checks and balances, with no, you know, no integrity, with no accountability is extremely, extremely prob problematic.
Dion Dawson:And when we look at, you know, nonprofits and when we look at feeding people, it has become about metrics that mean absolutely nothing as opposed to us just saying, hey. Okay. Cool. Well, you know, how do you know you were successful today? Well, I can go into our custom made dashboard and see that our dream score is a 9.89.
Dion Dawson:So that then tomorrow, if I come in and it's a 9.79, based upon all of the data inputs, I know something went wrong, and we can go directly to that, to that check that touch point with that household and see what happened. And we give them a call, and they'll say to us, Hey, well, we gave you a 2 for quality because my vegetables were spoiled. And we're able to say, Hold on now, miss Johnson. This was a fruit week. Did you leave your box out there all week?
Dion Dawson:And then they go out and they realize that that that type of being able to go directly, you know, to the very moment and make sure we're holding ourselves accountable. So then when we zoom out, we can still find ways to create diversified revenue streams without losing who we are. And I'm just honored that at our organization, we know who we are. And as a black founded organization, we've had to be on on our game. You know what I mean?
Dion Dawson:We've had to be do all of this just to stand out in a market that is not used to, you know, centering the things that we're centering, and that's why, you know, for us, we're saying, hey. You can go get Pepsi, and we'll be Coca Cola. You know what I mean? But at every chance we get, we're gonna talk about why we Coca Cola and y'all Pepsi.
Rhea Boyd:I mean, say just a smidge more on that, and then we're gonna come to some wrap up questions. Like, I wanna know more about what I want you to be more specific so our listeners really understand what you mean when you say, like, we've had to do a lot as a black run organization in this industry.
Dion Dawson:Well, I think, you know, first and foremost, you know, it there was a, I believe it's a Blackbaud Giving and Echoing Green report that basically laid out, you know, that that black led found founded organ black founded organizations are funded something more like more than 90% less than our white counterparts. You know what I mean? And so, you know, that's the data. But also, you know, it's the it's the the test and then it's the I test. And the I test is, you know, hey, you know, why should we, you know, invest in you or donate to you?
Dion Dawson:And our differentiators ultimately saved us. Our commitment to quality and our commitment to consistency saved us because if we were running a volunteer led program, I mean, you know, stepping back, monopolizing the pantry model was genius from a business perspective. And every day I fight and I always pray to take ego and emotion out of how I run my organization, how I am in my family, in my community, and just try to always be be anchored in appreciation. And I'm not mad at it, you know what I mean? But if, you know, our as a black led organization, as a man who does not have a college degree, you know, you're told in business that, you know, your results are your results.
Dion Dawson:But even in a market like this, you know, we've created an organization that, you know, has bucked every trend possible in one of the most volatile times in American history. And all we want is a fair shot, and, you know, at times we still won't get that. You know what I mean? And so in food distribution, if you look up whatever state you're in, I would love for you if you're listening to look up who are the major food nonprofits in your state. And I would love to see if there's a top ten that more than 2 people in that top ten are led by black founders or black leaders.
Dion Dawson:Because you would be surprised, I think you have to start, once we start looking and looking at data and we start looking at 990s on the IRS, website, you start looking at, you know, what's there, and it it it'll really show you beyond emotion, what what is actually fact, factual.
Rhea Boyd:Yeah. I feel like what you're also describing is that Black founders are perhaps also especially Black founders with experience with whatever, you know, their clients have, who share that experience with their clients. You're also up against this perspective on the nonprofit side that, like, giving is a charity, and that charity should look and run-in this very specific way. And around food, that specific way is the pantry.
Dion Dawson:Yes.
Rhea Boyd:And the pantry comes with all of its own limitations. In terms of access, you have to be able to get there. In terms of food supply, you take what you get, and you don't get any say. Right? In terms of who works there, it's typically volunteer led.
Rhea Boyd:And so you have created a completely different model because you also understand the implications of that charity type model, that handout type model for the clients receiving the food. Right? Like, how it makes them feel about themselves, how it makes, probably, even the volunteers who work there feel about the people that they serve and how it what it means about how all of us in society view people who are hungry.
Dion Dawson:Absolutely.
Rhea Boyd:I think that's incredibly powerful. Today, we've been talking to Dion Dawson, a food fighting social entrepreneur, philanthropic leader, veteran, and the founder and chief dreamer at Dion Chicago Dream. Dionne works on food insecurity, but really shared with us important pearls about the nonprofit industrial complex, about hunger and profit in the United States, and helps us better understand how we can approach these sticky, entrenched, long term chronic problems in America, not just as problems we should meet with good intent, but ones that we should meet driven by outcomes. Thank you so much for all that you do and for this conversation, Dion. It was a joy to have you a good day.
Dion Dawson:Thank you. No. I appreciate it. Thank you. You know, always honored to talk to the work, but, you know, we're only gonna get to where we need to get to with with, discourse.
Dion Dawson:I think that, you know, it's important not to think that we all are right all the time, but to just, you know, throw ideas back and forth with each other and, you know, just kinda keep moving forward. So it's always an honor to, you know, be able to just kinda talk shop a little bit.
Rhea Boyd:Right on. Thanks for listening to Research and Justice For All season 2. I'm your host, Rhea Boyd. Thanks for joining us. And if you like what you heard, click to subscribe to listen to future episodes.