Who Owns Imperfect Foods?

Ben Simon and Ben Chesler built the Food Recovery Network as undergraduates in 2011, rescuing surplus dining hall food from college campuses. Together with Ron Clark, a veteran of California food bank sourcing, they launched Imperfect Produce in the San Francisco Bay Area in the summer of 2015, selling weekly boxes of cosmetically flawed fruits and vegetables at roughly 30 percent below grocery prices.

The concept rode two trends at once: subscription e-commerce and consumer interest in food waste. Venture funding followed, and the service expanded from produce into dairy, meat, seafood, and pantry goods. In 2019 the company rebranded from Imperfect Produce to Imperfect Foods to reflect the wider assortment.

Leadership churned during the same period. Simon stepped down as CEO in 2019 for health reasons, Chesler served as interim chief, and Philip Behn, a former Walmart executive, led the company from late 2019 to 2021 through aggressive expansion and subsequent layoffs. Steve Nave and then Dan Park steered the company into the September 2022 sale to Misfits Market, by which point Imperfect had raised roughly $140 million in venture funding and built a national delivery footprint.

Integration after the acquisition took about a year. Misfits merged technology stacks, combined supply chains, unified loyalty programs in August 2023, and consolidated private label products under the Odds & Ends brand. The Imperfect Foods name and website survived as a customer-facing brand rather than being retired.