Meet the Natural Products Expo East 2021 NEXTY Awards judges

The NEXTY Awards is an awards program that recognizes the pinnacle of excellence in the natural products industry, elevating impactful brands and products that inspire a healthy, sustainable future for people and planet. 

Winning a NEXTY can have a profound impact on a brand, offering newfound exposure to investors, retailers, distributors, media, influencers and more. The finalists and winners are chosen in a thorough a two-tier judging process held in the New Hope Network office in Boulder, Colorado. 

Related: Everything you need to know about the NEXTY Awards

During the preliminary judging round, the internal New Hope Network content, marketing, standards and NEXT Data and Insights teams come together to whittle down hundreds of nominees to approximately 75 finalists. For the final judging round, New Hope Network invites a panel of industry experts to help the internal team select a single winner in each of the 23 categories. The finalists and winners are evaluated through deep discussion and debate on several criteria. These include written answers to what the company and product's innovation, inspiration and integrity is, the product's taste, ease of use, social and sustainability missions, diversity and inclusion practices, environmentally responsible packaging, labelling, brand storytelling, clean ingredients, nutritional quality and more. 

Given the switch to hybrid in-person and virtual events this year, this edition of the NEXTY Awards was open to those natural products CPG brands exhibiting in-person at Natural Products Expo East and/or on the Natural Products Expo Virtual platform, as well as to nonexhibitors. The winners of this round of these highly coveted awards will be announced virtually just before Natural Products Expo East, held Sept. 22-25, 2021, in Philadelphia. Prior to this, the NEXTY finalists will be announced on Aug. 24, 2021, on newhope.com.

To help the New Hope Network team select the NEXTY Awards winners, an experienced group of seven industry experts will weigh in with unique perspectives on which brands deserve a NEXTY Award. With a wealth of experience in retail, investment, manufacturing, sustainability, branding and nutrition access, this year's judging panel uplifts the excellence of the NEXTY Awards.

Click through this gallery to meet the guest judges and learn more about the expertise they’ll bring to the Natural Products Expo East 2021 NEXTY Awards judging panel.