Daniel Lubetzky

While I pride myself in the KIND culture embodied by our family at KIND, and while that includes always respecting our competitors, I couldn’t help commenting on the deceptive advertising by ThinkThin.

Fortunately the media has taken the lead to comment on how ThinkThin is an artificial blob of unpronounceable stuff and ranked ThinkThin as the WORST bar to consume.

But when I was walking by the Natural Products Expo East show and saw this sign, it prompted me to comment on how deceptive and deceitful it is.

First of all, their new tagline "It’s all about what’s inside" is embarrassing on their behalf, as "what’s inside" a ThinkThin bar is maltitol, an artificial product that does not exist in nature and does not belong in products proclaiming to be natural, along with other artificial ingredients that are hard to pronounce and that cause gas and bloating.

On top of that, they outright deceive consumers by comparing FRUIT & NUT bars to their bars, which contain no fruits, only nuts and artificial ingredients. They claim they have 70% less sugar that Fruit & Nut bars. But the way they achieve this feat is by a) including artificial sweeteners instead of real food like honey, and b) by excluding fruit but comparing themselves to a fruit bar. Well, fruit of course has natural sugar, and any nutritionist will recommend it to you. What nutritionists will not recommend is for you to eat maltitol or any of the unpronounceable stuff ThinkThin puts in their products.

If ThinkThin was honest it would have compared their Nut bars to NUT bars, such as KIND’s Nut Delight. If you make that comparison, their "70% less sugar" claim falls apart, and KIND’s Nut Delight, which doesn’t contain fruit, stands up much more favorably to the artificial nutritionals achieved by ThinkThin – with KIND’s product being totally natural and avoiding artificial sweeteners that are not found in nature, not to mention the supreme taste and quality of KIND products.

I have been in the natural industry for about 18 years and am proud that most companies are truly committed to truthfulness and integrity. It is disappointing when a few bad apples deceive consumers. ThinkThin has a history of trying to do so, growing, and then falling on its head and imploding when it is discovered. Its earlier incarnation was as a performance food bar that was supposed to make you smarter and all other sorts of nonsense. Then it imploded, and eventually it reinvented itself as a natural diet product, even though there is nothing natural about it.

Thomas Friedman’s column addresses the exact concerns that haunt the Middle East peace process today.  It is crucial for both sides to make compromises in the negotiations; instead of making speeches that delineate what’s in their own country’s best interest, Netanyahu and Abbas must make some concessions in good faith.  Netanyahu must fully freeze the settlements; Abbas must recognize that Israel will be the homeland of the Jewish people.  If these leaders do not look to acknowledge each other, this peace process will crumble, and there will be devastating, reverberating effects that reach far beyond the immediate region.

Spotted by Daniel Lubetzky, by Adeena Schlussel

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“Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.”

- Albert Einstein 

An exhibit at the Jerusalem Bloomfield Musuem is celebrating Israel’s top 45 greatest inventions, including amazing innovations like the electric car grid, surgical robots, the cherry tomato, and solar power systems.

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Fox news featured a piece by Men’s Journal correspondent about why KIND makes the perfect travel snack.  KIND is the perfect portion of nuts to keep you full and fuel you onward!

Check out the full coverage here:

Spotted by Daniel Lubetzky, by Adeena Schlussel

One of the joys of planting vegetables is that you can show kids the magic of nature – how a little seed can germinate and then yield flowers and fruits is truly a magical experience for your kids.  And, frankly, for us adults too.

Another benefit is that you can learn how things look like in nature! I’ve written before about how most of us have been so disconnected from the growing process that we no longer know what things look like in their original form, or where they come from.  {You can take this quiz to see if you can answer where things come from.}

But another thing I’ve gained even more appreciation for lately is how smart plants are.  It is truly outstanding.  These living organisms are far more complex than I ever imagined.

Just a couple of examples I’ve learned about recently:

· Cucumbers self-regulate themselves to bear fruits at the pace they know they can handle, based on the conditions of the environment they are in: some may yield many cucumbers at the same time, if the soil, water, and space conditions permit, while others will pace themselves and allow some to mature faster than others.

· Radishes (and many other vegetables and roots do this also) can judge if the conditions will permit them to bear fruit (not sure I am using the right term here, but whether to form radishes); if the conditions are not right, they can opt to skip that step and instead focus on building themselves into plants that will yield seeds so that their energy and growth are not wasted on a failed journey.

Check out this unbelievable video of Emmanuel Kelly stealing the show on the X Factor.  The only thing more compelling than his performance is his story.

Spotted by Daniel Lubetzky, by Adeena Schlussel

According to an article in Foreign Policy, Former President Bill Clinton blames PM Netanyahu for the lack of peace process progress.  Clinton specifically pointed to Netanyahu’s Administration for failing to accept the Camp David terms, as well as a change in Israeli demographic, making Israeli’s less open to peace.  As Clinton argues in this article, the peace process would benefit immensely from Netanyahu’s administration being more amenable to compromise. 

Spotted by Daniel Lubetzky, by Adeena Schlussel

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This great article in the New York Times illustrates the importance of occasional failure and the fortified character that it can build when accompanied by introspection.  This story of two high school principles (one, of a privileged school in Riverdale, and the other from KIPP) and their quest for placing as much importance on character excellence and grit as academic excellence, is an inspiring one.

Spotted by Daniel Lubetzky, by Adeena Schlussel

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I received this email from Gidi Grinstein, who I consider to be one of the brightest people I’ve ever met, and certainly one of the most  widely respected Israeli thinkers.  His Reut Institute firmly supports a two-state solution, and yet he has come to believe that can only come about through coordinated unilateralism because both the Israeli and Palestinian governments have structural, constitutional, and leadership impediments to pass through what would be necessary on either side to achieve a negotiated agreement.  Read his entire note:

Dear friends and supporters,

This email introduces Reut’s most recent strategic framework on the diplomatic and political opportunity that faces Israel in the United Nations this week, as an outcome of the Palestinian motion to recognize the Palestinian Authority as a state and accept it as a full member-state of the United Nations (Click here).

The Reut team, and specifically Roy Keidar, Reut’s new CEO and former Legal Advisor of the Israel’s National Security Council, and I, have been working hard behind the scenes for the past months, weeks and days, to introduce these ideas to top decision-makers, as well as to prepare for the aftermath of this Palestinian UN motion, which may include renewed efforts to de-legitimize Israel. We are now in NYC in part for this reason.

In a nutshell, we believe that Israel can leverage the Palestinian motion and pin down the principle of two-states-for-two-people, which has been a central objective of present and past Israeli governments. This will allow Israel to manage the process of establishing a Palestinian state in optimal conditions that not only address its major security and diplomatic concerns, but also allow for diluting Palestinian refugeeism and strengthening the status of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. These achievements are conditioned on Israel making a credible win-win offer to the Palestinians so that they too have historic achievements. These ideas are detailed in our paper.

For the past five years and since Hamas electoral victory in January 2006, Reut has consistently argued that ‘constructive and coordinated unilateralism’ is the only viable path for political progress between Israelis and Palestinians toward security and coexistence, and that all attempts to negotiate comprehensive agreements are unfortunately doomed to fail, as the case has been.

Therefore, we concluded a few years ago that the establishment of a Palestinian state would have to be through an act of declaration and recognition, which is exactly what is unfolding in the United Nations. Hence, Israel’s opportunity this week to create a political breakthrough, which is a win-win and good for the Palestinians as well.

It is no coincidence that de-legitimizing groups such as the Electronic Intifada are quoting Reut in their fight against the Palestinian motion in the UN (click here), as they principally oppose the Two-State Solution or any motion that explicitly or implicitly recognizes the right of the Jewish people to self-determination.

In the coming few days, we will send you a more comprehensive overview of the recent history that led to this milestone, covering Reut’s different efforts for the past seven years.

With best wishes of Shana Tova,

Gidi