Our Values

Kids Eat in Color^® is committed to providing parents with the support and guidance they need to help their kids eat better and thrive at mealtime. Every parent deserves to know what to do in challenging situations, to know they are not alone, and to feel less stressed.

We also improve the health of children. We help parents, caregivers, and health and medical providers learn evidence-based nutrition and feeding practices. Small changes make large differences in children’s health.

We Support All Families

Feeding kids is tricky; we know that. 

We understand deeply that most parents are busy, have a tight budget, or struggle to make changes. We know some kids have more challenges eating than others. That’s why we teach bite-sized strategies to help all parents feel better and help kids eat better. 

We also offer hardship pricing for all of our offerings to ensure that every family can get the tools they need.  

We do not support the concept of “bad food.” Every parent, regardless of what food they have access to, what cultural foods they eat, how much energy they have to prepare food, or how extremely picky their child is, is welcome in the Kids Eat in Color® community. Each family will choose the foods that are best for their family, where they are at, and it will look different for every family.  

Our Commitment to Social Equity

Life is complicated when it comes to feeding kids. We haven’t all been given the same playing field. Systemic discrimination has made sure that

• many neighborhoods and areas have lots of fresh food options, and many don’t have any
• many people can get jobs with pay high enough to easily feed their families, and many cannot
• some food cultures and foods are respected, and others are termed “unhealthy” and vilified in the media and wider culture
• some families are praised in medical settings due to their child’s size, and some are shamed and given dangerous advice (such as weight loss diets) without regard to a family’s capacity, economic status, food availability, or a child’s mental health

Kids Eat in Color® is committed to actively working toward social equity. We value and invest in strategic, lasting change. We try to be discerning around communications that feel performative and superficial. We put careful, intentional thought into our social media posts, in particular, ensuring that they’re followed up by informed education and calls to action. In that regard, we’re asking for your grace and benefit of the doubt if you don’t see us communicating about something you care about – it doesn’t mean we don’t care. It means we’re practicing grounding our care in real, meaningful action, and we’re trying to direct our limited capacity in the ways that will have the most impact.

Here’s what giving us the benefit of the doubt looks like: if you have an idea or partnership you’d like us to consider, or have a question about whether we support a specific cause, we’d love for you to send us an email via our contact form so we can begin the conversation in real life vs social media. We want to create the conditions for the complexity of social equity work to be grounded in our real relationships with real people, as opposed to the sometimes fleeting and always fast-paced nature of social media comments.

Here’s what some of our actions look like at present:

• The Kids Eat in Color® Child Nutrition Fellowship aims to help increase the number of BIPOC registered dietitians. Of registered dietitians, 81% are white, leaving many communities without dietitians that are able to provide empathetic, culturally appropriate care, and with culturally imbalanced nutrition recommendations in wider society. We hire BIPOC nutrition students for up to 4 years, providing economic support and resume-boosting high quality experience. This helps BIPOC students pay their way through school, get matched to competitive dietetic internships, and become registered dietitians.
• Operationally, we model fair and equitable hiring practices, pay living wages, and make philanthropic donations.

We stand behind efforts to bring equality and justice. The deep work we value in this space is often less visible, but we hope you’re able to feel the lasting impact of it.