Boulder-based Nude Foods Market is planning its next phase of growth, and doing so on its own terms.
The zero-waste grocer is exploring new locations in south Denver and seeing demand from Fort Collins, as it looks to expand to five Front Range stores in the coming years, co-founders said. The company is also considering relocating its Boulder store to a more prominent site.
The push comes after a burst of national attention this spring, when Nude Foods appeared on Shark Tank, an opportunity that came after producers reached out and encouraged the company to apply.
“At the time, honestly, I was a bit like, we are not a great Shark Tank fit. We’re a retail store,” said co-founder Verity Noble. “Is this really worth the time?”
Noble submitted an application, expecting another round of interviews. Instead, she got a scheduling call.
“Can you fly out to L.A. in a month?” she recalled being asked. “So they flew us out there. It was a wonderful experience. The whole thing was so fun,” she said.
The company received investment offers from Kevin O’Leary and Robert Herjavec and accepted a deal on air. But the agreement ultimately fell through after filming.
“They didn’t have a ton of retail experience or food experience. It just didn’t end up being a good fit for either party,” Noble said. “We have since decided that we’re probably not going ahead with the investment offer, because we really want to focus on community investment.”
So far, Nude Foods’ growth has been entirely community-supported, including through a still-active Wefunder campaign, a crowdfunding platform that allows individuals to invest small amounts of money in private companies in exchange for equity, co-founder Rachel Irons said.
“That really feels good to us, because we want the people invested in the company to be aligned with our values,” she said.
Nude Foods started after Covid first struck in 2020, built from frustrations both founders had with the conventional food system. The company now operates a Boulder storefront, a Denver location that opened in April 2024, and an e-commerce platform.
“I really just couldn’t bear going into a grocery store and seeing all that plastic, and thinking, ‘This turns over on a weekly basis and it’s basically all going into the earth,’” Noble said.
Irons, who had completed her master’s in environmental studies at CU Boulder, was focused on the broader impacts of a food system she saw as harmful to both consumers and the land. She was also exploring alternatives, including the idea that consuming invasive species could offer a rare environmental win-win.
“I hadn’t eaten meat in like 10 years since I’m very against supporting any type of factory farming,” Irons said. But the idea of eating invasive species prompted a broader rethink.
“We already have solutions to a lot of these problems,” she said. “We have this huge industrial agriculture system that is exploiting along every step of the way, but there are solutions that just aren’t really being explored. Invasive species is just one of them. What if you could have a whole store that was bringing together all of these different sources that are truly sustainable, regenerative things?”
The two connected, along with other co-founders who have since taken a back seat in the operation, and launched the business as a delivery model early in the pandemic.
That allowed them to get their feet under them before opening their Boulder storefront on Walnut and 32nd St. in October 2021.
The model centers on buying food in bulk and repackaging it in reusable glass jars. Customers pay $1.50 per jar and receive a $1 refund when they return it, with the remainder covering cleaning costs. A membership option eliminates the per-jar fees.
“There is almost no single-use packaging, so your food is in glass rather than plastic,” Noble said. “We make it really easy for the customer to choose reusables instead.”
That ease is intentional. Noble recalled seeing a sign at another grocery store reminding customers to bring reusable bags.
“I thought, that’s just putting even more on the consumer,” she said. “You have to use reusable stuff, but we’ll continue to use single-use plastic so you can fill your reusable bag with all the single-use plastic.”
They aim to make Nude Foods a full-service grocery store that can be customers’ primary store. They stock bread, produce, meat, snacks, body care and cleaning products — everything you’d expect in a normal grocery store, but with reusable packaging.
“The big difference between shopping with us and shopping with another store is people don’t feel guilty,” Noble said. “That’s what we’ve heard a lot.”
Most of their selection is vegan, but they eventually brought in meat, including wild boar sourced from Texas.
“They’re in 45 states and cause billions of dollars in property damage every year,” Irons said. “And they’re really common to eat in Europe.”
The store also offers prepared meals made in-house. An in-house chef prepares eight different pre-packaged meals each week, released in two batches, with a mix of vegan options and sustainably, ethically raised meat. There’s often a soup option, an Asian fusion dish and a chef’s choice.
“They are totally prepared and ready to go,” Noble said. “People just reheat them and eat them, and they are super nutritious, no preservatives, made from whole foods and absolutely delicious.”
She said 45% of the store’s products are locally sourced. Irons vets each vendor and visits local farms as part of that process.
“Our goal is that we’ve done all of the research, and made sure that all of our products are up to health and environment standards, so that customers don’t have to think about that,” Irons said.
That approach adds complexity. Most grocery stores work with a single distributor, Irons said. Nude Foods works with more than 100 vendors and must manage logistics around bulk purchasing, packaging and quality control.
“So we have lots of spreadsheets.”
Even so, the founders argue the model can be more sustainable for producers by reducing the number of intermediaries.
“When you have packaged products, they go through so many middlemen,” Irons said. “It makes it really hard for the people that are actually making and growing the food to survive.”
The company’s next challenge is scaling that system. Nude Foods is exploring additional locations and looking to raise the capital needed to expand, while maintaining its community-backed approach.
“We hope to expand to five stores on the Front Range in the next few years, so there’s lots in the works right now, but we need to raise more money to make all that happen,” Noble said.
Longer term, the company hopes to replicate its hub-and-spoke model in other regions, with local suppliers feeding into a central distribution point.
“We’ll probably follow [local suppliers’] footprint largely because they will already have that network of local makers and farmers,” Noble said.
