Ian Brandt was born in 1975 and grew up in Philadelphia, as a child, Ian disliked the idea of stuffing animals in little boxes as veal, it seemed inhuman, and as time went by he gradually stopped consuming meat and became fully vegan at the end of college. Ian loved being in the kitchen and while he was young, he was always in there with his grandmother and aunt; he wasn’t really into the other things kids his age were into and preferred hanging around the kitchen. In our conversation, you will see that Ian never learned his culinary skills but through self-development and constantly trying, he was able to attain the height he’s found himself now. 

When Ian’s partner was pregnant they became skeptical about feeding their child dairy milk after reading books by John Robbins where they learned that being completely vegan could help reduce many health risks.

Ian’s enterprunership journey began in 1998 after finishing college when he started the second-ever food cart on the streets of Salt Lake City. He also brought his vegan food cart to the farmers’ market, and summer concert series in the area. During that time Ian learned a lot about vegan food preparation and got first-hand experience in customer relationship management.

A year after starting his food cart business he opened up Sage Café named after his son, a vegan based café which afforded people the opportunity to eat healthy. Several years later, after seeing the desire for vegan comfort food, Ian got the idea of opening a vegan diner. When an opportunity showed up to open a diner, he took it and the vertical diner was born, a diner where everything was prepared with organic ingredients and where people can actually eat better comfort food. 

In this episode, he says he doesn’t see veganism as a trend but a necessity, and that it is high time people stop eating animals. Ian also touches on some of the challenges he faced one of which includes keeping product cost low and having enough kitchen space. These challenges are one of the reasons why he bought an off-site commercial kitchen to create, prepare, and store the food for his two restaurants. He now uses this space to create and prepare food for other restaurants including his sought-after plant-based meat alternatives called Tender Tigers. 

After the tremendous success of the Vertical Diner in Salt Lake, 2019 Ian open a second location in Portland, Oregon to much fan fair.