The 4P Foods Story

At 4P Foods, we're rebuilding a regenerative and equitable food system—one rooted in people, planet, and purpose.

We believe good food should nourish our bodies, our communities, and the land it comes from. That’s why we work every day to connect local and regional farmers with the people and institutions who need their food the most.

Our work started with one person (our founder, Tom) delivering bags of farm-fresh food on the DC Metro. Today, we’re proud to serve mission-aligned businesses and organizations across the Mid-Atlantic. As we’ve grown, our mission has remained the same.

4P Foods has three main areas of business

Our work centers around three core lines of business—all designed to make healthy, local food more accessible:

1. Farm to Institution

We're reimagining institutional food by building regional supply chains that bring fresh, locally grown food to schools, universities, hospitals, and more. By connecting institutions directly with farmers, we’re improving access to healthy meals and supporting sustainable agriculture across our region.

2. Wholesale

We deliver fresh, regenerative food to retail outlets, restaurants, markets, and food businesses. Our wholesale network supports mission-aligned buyers who want to offer transparent, local, and ethically grown products to their customers—and make a real difference in the food system. 

3. Food is Medicine

We believe fresh, nutritious food is essential to good health. That’s why we partner with clinics, nonprofits, and healthcare providers to deliver local produce and eggs through Food Is Medicine initiatives. These partnerships help nourish individuals living with chronic conditions and food insecurity—while supporting the farmers who grow our food.

Our Milestones

• 4P Foods was founded in 2014 with a simple but powerful mission: to build a food system that is equitable, regenerative, and resilient—one that works for people, the planet, and producers. What began as a vision to connect eaters with local, responsibly grown food has since grown into a regional food distributor working across the Mid-Atlantic to shift how food is sourced, distributed, and valued.

• Since 2018, that mission has gained momentum. In partnership with long-time allies like the Washington Nationals Philanthropies/Youth Baseball Academy and the YMCA of Metropolitan Washington, we began distributing over 3,000 subsidized 4P Produce Bags each year at a year-round market in DC’s Ward 7. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, this location pivoted to a contactless pickup model, continuing to serve the community’s needs. Through the Bainum Family Foundation’s Food Security Initiative, we extended our impact in Wards 7 and 8, while also becoming an operational partner for Local Food Hub’s Fresh Farmacy Program—tripling its reach in 2020 to meet skyrocketing demand during the pandemic.

• 2019 marked a milestone in scaling our impact when 4P Foods acquired Local Food Hub’s wholesale operations and Charlottesville warehouse. This expansion enabled us to connect even more small and mid-sized farmers to larger, values-aligned markets.

• In 2020, we helped co-found the first-ever food hub trade agreement, the Eastern Food Hub Collaborative, which has since grown to include over 15 hubs across the Eastern Seaboard. That same year, we moved into our Vint Hill, VA warehouse with the support of the PATH Foundation and co-founded the Mid-Atlantic Food Resilience and Access Coalition (MAFRAC), a rapid-response network formed at the start of the pandemic to ensure communities had reliable access to nutritious food. Between April and July 2020, we partnered with Community Cooks to distribute over 10,000 meals to community members in need.

• In 2021, our belief that food is medicine came to life through a pilot with 4pf (FLiPRX), the YMCA of Metropolitan Washington, and the American Heart Association, delivering produce directly to food-insecure families in D.C.

• By 2022, our supplier network grew to over 200 regional producers. We were proud to begin supplying Elon University, which partnered with Piedmont Progressive Farmers Cooperative to purchase more than 234,000 pasture-raised eggs from Black-owned farms, advancing our shared commitment to racial equity in the food system.

• In 2023, we ramped up our Local Food Purchasing Assistance (LFPA) work, channeling $4 million into the regional food system and reaching over 70,000 Virginia families with locally grown food. Our partnership with the UVA Sustainable Food Collaborative led to a 40% increase in purchasing from BIPOC farmers, expanding sourcing to more than 18 BIPOC-led farms. In total, we invested $7.4 million directly in regional farmers—an increase of 44% from 2021.

• In 2024, we celebrated 10 years of impact—marking over $12 million in local food delivered for the year and welcoming 30 new producers to our network. We launched a new Veterans Health Administration pilot in Maryland, providing year-long produce prescriptions to 250 food-insecure veterans. We also transitioned away from B2C grocery delivery, selling that portion of our business to South Mountain Creamery so we could focus on wholesale and institutional programs. Our work with Virginia’s Farm-to-School program delivered local food to 644 schools, and we proudly recognized Fairfax and Prince William County Public Schools for their leadership in local sourcing.

• Now in 2025, with over $60 Million worth of local food delivered to date, we are scaling the impact of our work. We’re excited to be expanding our Food Is Medicine programs, with support from a three-year grant from The Rockefeller Foundation, aiming to reach thousands more families across the region. We’re also doubling down on our efforts to make farm-to-institution the norm for institutional sourcing, creating markets for local producers at a large scale. Meanwhile, our coalition building continues throughout the region, advocating for interconnected regional and regenerative food systems that support our communities, our farmers, and our planet. This is powered by innovative technology tools to weave it all together. This coming year, we’ll be building out our tech even further to help support not only 4P Foods’ operations, but the regional food ecosystem that we are a part of. None of this is possible without our amazing team of People who share a passion for this Mission. 11 years in, we’re just getting started.