Riveo Impact Lab

Why Accessibility Is Good Business — And What Every Leader Should Know with Amy Graves

• Elin Barton, Emily Adams • Season 1 • Episode 6

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How can businesses take small, meaningful steps toward inclusivity — and why is accessibility not just ethical, but strategic?

In this episode of Riveo Impact Lab, co-hosts Elin Barton and Emily Adams welcome Amy Graves, California Chapter President of NAWBO, founder and CEO of Hidden Consumer Consulting, and author of The Hidden Consumer. Amy shares her personal and professional journey as a disabled entrepreneur and industry consultant, and explores how accessibility and inclusive practices drive both human and business impact.

Tune in as we discuss:

  • The real-life challenges that inspired Amy’s mission-driven work
  • How accessible practices lead to broader market reach and brand loyalty
  • Why accessibility should be embedded in company culture — not bolted on
  • Easy first steps any leader can take to make their workplace more inclusive

Whether you're just starting out or seeking to deepen your understanding, this conversation offers powerful insights into building a business that includes everyone.


The Riveo Impact Lab is produced for you by Riveo Creative. For more Riveo Impact Lab content, including the video versions of all our episodes, please visit https://riveocreative.com/riveo-impact-lab/.

[electronic music starts]

Emily Adams:

Welcome to the Riveo Impact Lab, the podcast in which we explore what it means for small businesses to have real impact in an evolving world. On this podcast, we engage our curiosity around topics like sustainability, diversity and inclusion, and the ethical outcomes of our decisions, all from a small business perspective.

Elin Barton:

I'm Elin and this is my co-host, Emily.

Emily Adams:

At Riveo Creative, we've been talking a lot about accessibility in the past year. Inclusivity has always been one of our core values. And yet, as we began to look more into accessibility, we realized just how little we actually knew. That's why we quickly gathered a support team of people who are experts regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion, and formed our Diversity Advisory Board. One of those experts is Amy Graves, who we speak to on this episode of the Riveo Impact Lab.

Elin Barton:

Amy is a web analytics expert, the Director of Accessibility for the National Association of Women Business Owners, or NAWBO, California, Chapter President of the NAWBO Inland Empire, founder and CEO of Hidden Consumer Consulting, and author of The Hidden Consumer. Amy has been working with the Riveo Creative team for the past five years, and we trust her with all things related to SEO. In this episode, however, Amy offers insight into what it means to foster a workplace culture that is inclusive and accessible, as well as the small steps any business can take to make this happen. Please enjoy our lovely conversation with Amy Graves.[electronic music concludes] Amy, hey. Nice to see you.

Amy Graves:

Nice to see you too. I'm so excited.

Elin Barton:

I know. I'm excited to talk with you today. We have this podcast, and it's all about impact. And, in thinking about who we wanted to bring on as guests, you were top of the list.

Amy Graves:

Aw, thank you.

Elin Barton:

So let's just start talking a little bit about you and how you got on this whole entrepreneurial journey in the first place.

Amy Graves:

I knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur, like, 20 years ago when I was working in retail, and I was doing some really amazing things, turning stores around. And I didn't like the retail aspect of always having to work on the sales floor with the clients.[Laughs] But I did some really good work understanding numbers and human behavior, and I wanted to try and apply that to my own business. But it took me 20 years. We moved to California and I couldn't find employment. Every time I went in for a job interview, it was something about my crutches, because I'm disabled, and people were refusing to hire me. So I'm like, “Well, if I'm going to start up my own company, now's the time.” So I did. So it became more of, I needed to do this, is why I started my entrepreneurial journey, so I can make money.[Laughs]

Elin Barton:

But, Amy, they weren't hiring you because of your crutches? That seems...

Amy Graves:

Illegal?

Elin Barton:

Yeah, illegal and antiquated. And what the heck?

Amy Graves:

[Laughs] Yeah.

Elin Barton:

How was this happening?

Amy Graves:

So there's a law in California that allows companies to work— there's a loophole in this law that allows companies to at least say they're not going to hire you, because their risk management board feels you're a threat to the safety of employees around you. So because I use crutches, the “threat” is that people could trip over my crutches. So I am a risk to the company.

Elin Barton:

Okay, I got a lot of problems with that, but we're going to move on. We're going to move on because you did, you, you, you know, took that situation. You started a business. It's led you on this, like, really interesting journey. Do you want to just talk briefly about your business and what it is that you actually do? Your core business. We're going to get into the new thing later.

Amy Graves:

Okay, the new thing later. Okay, so.

Elin Barton:

Yeah.

Amy Graves:

That journey itself is also hilarious. I started March, I opened March 3rd, 2020.[Amy and Elin Laugh] Was perfect timing. Perfect timing.

Elin Barton:

It couldn't be better. [Laughs]

Amy Graves:

Couldn’t be better. I wanted to be, basically, I'm a certified business analyst, so I wanted to be the business analyst that helped companies figure out what's going on inside your company that's causing you not to grow, and, by going through data and talking about marketing strategies and really determining what your next step is. And covid hit 11 days later and nobody wanted that. Like I got nothing. It just died. So I looked at what, using my business analyst skills, what is the one problem everybody's having because we're all virtual? And it came down to your websites. So I jumped into working on websites and because I need data, I jumped in using Google Analytics right away. Started with Universal, wasn't really happy with the data feed. And then they launched Google Analytics 4. So I jumped on Google Analytics 4, December 2020, and I've been using it ever since. But it's because of that data I've been able to use my business analyst experience, my previous retail experience, and I help people understand how websites are the foundation of your digital marketing experience and if your website doesn't create value and engagement with your ideal client, you're never going to get your website to work for you. So that's what I do today is how do we make those websites be so valuable that people spend time, that they want to work with you, and it leads to conversion?

Elin Barton:

Yeah. And we could spend our whole time talking about that and Google Analytics 4. We're not going to do that. [Laughs] We're not going to do that...

Amy Graves:

[Laughs]

Elin Barton:

...because we're only here to talk about impact. First I want to just like bring up the NAWBO, the National Association of Women Business Owners. You got involved with them as a business owner, and now you're the Director of Accessibility for, is it for California?

Amy Graves:

Yeah. Yep.

Elin Barton:

Okay. Okay. So you're, you're, you're the Director of Accessibility for NAWBO for California. You're a member of our Diversity Advisory Board. So I want to, you know, obviously, this is important to you and you've already shared discrimination you've experienced. But beyond that, why is accessibility so important to small businesses and business owners? Why should it be so important? Let me rephrase the question. [Laughs]

Amy Graves:

It absolutely should be. A lot of what I want to do is turn the, the scenario around, too. So there's going to be a couple thoughts here coming out, but. Before I became disabled because I haven't been disabled my entire life, you know, you would, I would hear family and friends talk about “those stupid disabled people. They're shutting down businesses just because they don't have access. They're deliberately looking for people and suing them just to shut down the small businesses.” Like that's not the case. If you flip that scenario around, my question back is, why do disabled people not have a right to do business with you? So accessibility isn't—I mean, ADA laws are the basement level of inclusion and it's not an inclusion. I mean, ADA is, this is the bare minimum you need to do to not get sued. If you can't hit the bare minimum, maybe you need to rethink about how you do business and if maybe you have to move it online, which then it's still a whole, whole set of issues because you still have to be ADA accessible online, which I do help people with somewhat on their websites. But it's this thing where why, as a disabled person, am I constantly being excluded? I got involved with NAWBO on the accessibility side because they weren't including people with disabilities, and that's where my fight with them right now is. And I'm going to call it a fight because it is. Inclusion is the ceiling. You should always reach for, “how high can I go? How many people can I bring in to be involved and be part of it?” Versus, “Oh, they're disabled. We've got ADA. I'm not going to worry about including them because if they can get in the door, who cares?” And that's what a majority of businesses and a majority of organizations consider accessibility. Just let them in the door. And most of the time, you still can't get in the door...[laughs]...or the door is like two miles away and you still have to walk an extra two miles.[Laughs]

Elin Barton:

It's really crazy, thinking about all the, like, physical locations that are just not accessible. You know, it happens plenty in our own country, but I was traveling in Europe with cobblestone streets and really, super old buildings, steep stairs. And I understand that there are reasons that some of those buildings can't be modified and so on and so forth, but it's really a big deal, you know, that there's all these places that people with disabilities can't access. And it's not just physical, it's online too. It's, I was looking at a website the other day that, it just had so much going on. It's like animation, not just animation, but like, tons of different video, flash pop-up things. You know, all, so much happening. And I was like... [laughing]...I was thinking about you. And I thought, “Amy would hate this.”[Laughs]

Amy Graves:

[Laughs]

Elin Barton:

My own mom is losing her vision. So we're, we're all learning how to use screen readers and how to, like, help her navigate that. And I guess that's pretty common is like when it hits you personally, that's what you really understand. But can you explain a little bit about like, why something like that crazy website is really problematic and, and locks people out, locks a lot of people out.

Amy Graves:

There's two big things about that, is when it comes to a website, the more animation, the more videos, the more movement, the more things, you just like, you threw the whole kitchen sink at one page, it's going to slow down your ability to load. So that means people on older technology are not going to be able to, to see your website. And my first question is, did you design the website for your ideal client, or did you design it because it's what you wanted and you had a fear of missing out? Most people design their websites based on FOMO and that kills your website hardcore. The other issue is, and I'm going to give you a personal experience here. I was working with a client and they rebuilt and they were so excited. They had this great new home page for their website, and they animated and created motion for every single text box and image on site. I literally got sick and had to shut down the website because I could not get through the first top half of the page because there was so much movement. So people with disabilities who are any, on different aspect of the spectrum, you get motion sickness, looking at a website like that, if you need to take drugs to look at a website, yeah, website probably needs to be taken down a notch. [Laughs]

Elin Barton:

Yeah.

Amy Graves:

It comes down to one simple thing, those kinds of things. It's not that you can't use them. You have to be strategic. Right? This was a PR company. We don't need to animate your headlines. We do need a headline and animate your images. We want people to stop and look at the images of what you've done for your previous clients, because your PR, it's about that visual experience. That's where the strategy comes in and where I would come in and also show you why the numbers show that's what you need to do. But yeah, it's, it's gross. I get so mad.[Laughs]

Elin Barton:

Yeah, and unfortunately, I, I don't know, I'm not an expert in this area. You may have better insight, but it seems to me that probably still the majority of websites or, you know, maybe at least half, are just not very user friendly if you're using something like a screen reader, if you're, I don't know, colorblind or you have other issues. There's just a lot of un-optimal websites out there.

Amy Graves:

Yeah. And I actually, I really blame that on traditional search engine optimization. Like, it's that, traditional SEO was all about dropping people on a website and not caring what the website, as long as they draw as many people as possible, they'll just get the numbers randomly. But that doesn't create a website that engages people, and that doesn't create a website where you actually have to put your focus on who you want to work with. So the websites, almost all websites today are based on the business owner and what they want to see on a website, which does nothing for your business and it does nothing for accessibility. If I, like, my website still has issues. I have a plug-in for ADA because I can't fix everything. But you know, I have problems with my colors. My colors are not color... are not colorblindness friendly. So I'm constantly trying to rework, how do I make this and just make this, like, an accent color so that it's not interfering with what people are reading and how they're engaging with the website? So it's, it's a constant, you have to constantly think about it from someone else's perspective, which as humans, that's not our priority, right? And that’s part of it. [Laughs]

Elin Barton:

It's true, until it hits you directly, like with my mom or with you, you know, the issues that you've had to face. And so I think we're, you know, we're talking about two different things. Physical accessibility. Like, you're running into some issues with NAWBO, being able to get into certain buildings and, you know, other issues. And the digital accessibility. So just talking like in broad terms, let's say there's a business owner listening to this podcast and they say,“Oh, I would like to do better.” Where's a good place to start with either of those, you know, items? It can feel overwhelming because there's, there's a lot to think about.

Amy Graves:

Yeah. I would say the first two things to do for your website is turn off all animations and get rid of the videos in your banner. Start there. Simple, easy. I know it's going to hurt. Everyone tells me, “But, but, but I love my videos. But, but, but.” It's okay. You can put them elsewhere. I'm not saying no, but if it's, especially on your homepage. Put your focus on your homepage. We'll leave everything else alone. But your homepage has to load quickly because the other pages will load while someone's on your homepage. But that homepage has to be snap of your fingers load, or you're going to lose everybody. The other thing is, I challenge you to go through read every word on your homepage in a monotone voice. Do you understand the sentences if you read it in a monotone voice and stop at the punctuation? So for instance, like your mom, you know, you're learning screen readers. The system is reading the page to you. There's no inflection of emotion, right? That, that period, you got to be clear, concise and have like under 20 words for a sentence for someone hearing your website to understand what you're trying to convey. So those are the two things to start with.

Elin Barton:

Yeah. No, that's great advice. And I also would invite anybody to try to use one of those screen readers. You'll understand very quickly.

Amy Graves:

[Laughs]

Elin Barton:

Yeah. And we're going to get to this in a minute, talking about your initiative around hidden consumers, because this is not only the right thing to do, but it is a big audience that people are missing out on if they're not doing these things. But before we go there, I just want to ask you, and you may not have an answer for this; I don't know. But do you know of any new like, tech, technological innovations or anything that has come out recently or is coming out that's going to, be beneficial for improving accessibility?

Amy Graves:

Actually, it's the one that everyone talks about. And it’s the thing I actually have the most distrust and dislike for right now. But from an accessibility standpoint, it's very important. And it's AI.

Elin Barton:

I knew you were going to say that. [Laughs]

Amy Graves:

[Laughs]

Elin Barton:

AI, yes.

Amy Graves:

Yeah, AI is not my favorite tool. As a tech person, I'm very concerned. I'm doing some different things in my company right now that I don't want AI to learn on my tech, and I don't want them to learn on what I'm doing, because I want to kind of keep what I'm doing to myself until I can really get it out there so people understand what I do. And AI, if they're learning on it, they're stealing it. Like that's just what it is. If you're using a free AI software, you're allowing AI to train on your, your intellectual property. So there's, there's this line. There's a line. I do use it in certain cases. But from, like, the, from a, from a person with a disability, AI is going to be beneficial because you can just feed it something and get that information back. It might, I mean, there's just, there's ways that tool is going to be beneficial for those who need additional help and support. I don't know I'll, I don't use it right now for that specific purpose. So I can't be really concise on what that looks like. But I know people in my Chronic Boss Collective group where AI is an important part of what they do today. Like they depend on that so heavily because it's an accessibility thing. But like all good things for, that end up coming out for people with accessibilities, someone's going to find another way to use it and it won't be as accessible. [Laughs] Like that's just how it works.[Laughs]

Elin Barton:

Well, someone was talking about, it might have been you even. I can't remember who I was having this conversation with, but it was about how sometimes technology is developed not necessarily with the intention of helping with accessibility. Like Siri. And it ends up to be such a valuable tool in that community. It's sort of the best of both worlds because it benefits everybody.

Amy Graves:

Smart technology, there's a lot of people in the background that, especially if you work in tech, smart technology is something to still be worried about and to really be cautious with using. But for someone with a disability, if you can't get out of bed and you can just tell your home system to turn the lights on, I mean, how amazing is that, that you've just gained a whole nother level of independence because you don't have to wait for someone to come home and flip a light on because you can't get up and do it yourself. That, I'm speaking from previous experience. Like when I went into paralysis in 2008, before, before we had the speech to text software on phones. Like Dragon software was top of the line, remember?

Elin Barton:

I do actually, yeah. Yep

Amy Graves:

[Laughs] And to think, like, in less than 20 years, we've taken that technology. We can control our homes. So now, if I was at home paralyzed and not able to move sitting in the dark because my husband doesn't get home till midnight because of, he’s coaching basketball, I could have just said,“Alexa, turn on my lights.” I didn't have to sit in the dark. [Laughs]

Elin Barton:

Right. Right.

Amy Graves:

So, yeah, that's a great example of a technology though, that does exactly that. And it's very beneficial to those with disabilities.

Elin Barton:

Yeah. No, that's a really good point. And I imagine that in the coming years, that's just going to evolve more and become more customized, I guess, to each person and what they need.

Amy Graves:

I would say in the last five years, I don't, I don't think even the last ten years, but at least in the last five years, there's been more emphasis put on accessibility. You can do, go into Word and you can tell it what to type up for you and it will do your corrections. So you don't have to actually be typing. But even on your browsers, you have accessibility settings now. Like go to Chrome, go to whatever you use and you can turn on accessibility, so you can talk to your browser and it will pull up the website you're looking for. So yeah, there's, there's some great technology coming out.

Elin Barton:

When we talk about impact, you know, this is one way that we're able to, I guess, make an impact is to reach, to make sure that our message is getting to a previously marginalized group of people, who were unable to receive it. And I do think that many of us have never really gave that a lot of thought, you know, realized how challenging it, it is to live with certain conditions. And, and now that there's maybe more awareness and there's more tools and, you know, we do have an ability to do more. At this point, I'm going to switch over and invite a conversation around the hidden consumers work that you're doing because this is, you know, talk about impact. This is really, really cool. Do you want to, do you want to talk a little bit more about some of your own challenges, like with food and that because I think that might lead well into this segment.

Amy Graves:

Into the next conversation? Yes. [Laughs]

Elin Barton:

[Laughs] So, as much as you want to share. You know, your story is interesting. And, I hope you're okay with me sharing this, but you have suspicion, you told me, that could possibly, you know, some of the pesticides you were exposed to as a child on commercial farms may have had a role to play in, in what you've been dealing with.

Amy Graves:

Yeah, yeah. So Hidden Consumers is something I always wanted to do when I opened my business. I wanted to really work in the food industry based on my own experience. But I got started with it because I understood that, when it came to websites, we have so many hidden consumers for every industry that we don't realize. And, so Hidden Consumers slowly evolved out of that. And about two years ago, two years, almost three years ago now, I made the decision that I wanted to finally move my way into working with the food industry, specifically, because of my own background. Around the time I was dealing with paralysis and I had gone down, and then I developed a few other issues along the way, things started coming back that I was reacting to food, and at first we thought it was just wheat and soy. Well, wheat. So I did the whole gluten free thing. Got really sick. It wasn't the wheat. Then I'm like, “Oh, it's got to—” Then I started seeing a connection that soy was involved. So I'm like, “Okay, I'm gonna take out everything that’s soy.” Still got sick. Like it was wheat, soy. Like it helped. I got a little bit better, but I wasn't, I wasn't better. And I finally got to a point where, I had a sinus infection, and it lasted for three years. And I had to go in and have it surgically removed from—they, we, we had saw a spot. A hole had developed because I had been blowing my nose so much, I literally ripped part of the lining of my, my nasal cavity. So we had to go in and do some work. But the big thing that came out of it, he goes, when the doctor came out and he's like,“You need to understand that people who have an infection to the extent that you do, it's always connected back to food. You have to find out what you're allergic to.” And that began my process. That was 2013. 2016, I figured out fully it was corn and all corn derivatives, and I'm super sensitive. So basically I'm allergic to life, because corn is used in everything. It's not just, you know, popcorn and corn on the cob. It's dextrose. It's polyester. It's nylon. It's like anything we use in life today. It's your—I had to gut my kitchen. Like my pans all had that, that nonstick coating which is made from corn starch. I had to go to all stainless. I mean, my food tastes way better today than it did six years ago... [Laughs]...ten years ago or whatever now. But yeah, it was, it became this whole process of. And then because of it, I had to understand how our food is actually made in a lab because I am so sensitive. If an ingredient is made in the lab and the base element is corn, I'm going to have a reaction to it. I'm like a parts per billion person. So I'm super rare and I get it. I'm super rare. And I thought it was only me. But the more I shared my journey as I was going on this because I shared everything like, “Can you believe that they put corn in this? Why is this made from corn?” Like I was telling the world and you know. People were like, “Amy, you need to write a book,” which I finally did, but we’ll get there. [Laughs]

Elin Barton:

Okay, wait. Give us some example. What are some, what are some, what are some things that corn is present in that you wouldn't think?

Amy Graves:

Socks. Socks.

Elin Barton:

What?

Amy Graves:

You know.[Laughs] The elastic bands that you have in your—socks is like, because I had to throw away all my socks. But elastic bands are pretty much coated in corn starch. I would break out in hives wherever my socks touched my skin.

Elin Barton:

Wow.

Amy Graves:

I wore a nylon dress to a wedding, and I had hives and a rash whever the dress touched my skin.

Elin Barton:

Oh my goodness.

Amy Graves:

It was bad.

Elin Barton:

So you can only wear cotton, like natural fibers, I assume?

Amy Graves:

Natural fibers. Yeah, yeah. Or why, why is there corn starch in my sugar? Why is there corn starch in my salt? Like I can't use basic table salt. I can't use basic table sugar. I can't use anything like Sugar in the Raw or any of those sugars, because they're all involve corn starch, like it's, or, like it's all there. And it's legal to put it in there without saying it's in there because it's “not intended for digestion.” Like if it's in my food, I'm digesting it. I don't care what your intention is.[Laughs] But who knows that? Like I didn't, until I had to dig into it and find out, why am I reacting to sugar? Why am I reacting to salt? Like it was a whole thing. I got so mad.[Laughs]

Elin Barton:

That's, that's really, really interesting. So it, so this whole journey led you on this hidden consumers path.

Amy Graves:

Path, yeah. So what I realized along the way is that I'm not the only one. And the more I talk about my story, the more people tell me, “You know, I know so-and-so” or “I'm in this boat too where I have to be really diligent, not to your level, but I have to be diligent too.” A majority of people are struggling with their food. They don't understand how their food has certain ingredients or why. So one of the things I, when I was researching my book, that I discovered is that the population of people who are between 30 and 40 years old right now have the highest level of kidney failure, linked back to our lab-created sugars that are in our energy drinks, our sodas, hidden sugars that are in “sugar-free” food. They're not really sugar free. I'm just going to tell you that right now. There's like 50 names for sugar that don't say “sugar.” As long as it doesn't say “sugar,” it's sugar free. Like the whole system is, is like, if you don't know how to shop for food and understand the ingredients, it, you're going to continue to get sick. That's just how it is. But the number of people that like, are in kidney failure, though, are equivalent to the population of the state of New York.

Elin Barton:

Wow. This is why we’re seeing so many dialysis centers popping up and people needing kidney transplants is becoming more and more common. It's, it's linked back to our food. And there's peer-reviewed research, which is what I focus on for my book is—it's not going to be in the book. Just, just not going to scare people.[Laughs][Laughs] Well you were telling me you love research. You love doing research.

Amy Graves:

I do. I have a, I'm a historian. Like I got my undergraduate degree in history, which is just research and analysis. So like I'm in my element if I could be in a library digging and yeah, that's, that's me.[Laughs]

Elin Barton:

So this book is, it is well researched, but presented in a, presented in a like, conversational, easy-to-understand way. And what will it help people do or understand?

Amy Graves:

What it's really going to do is help, it's going to help businesses, especially in the food industry, understand how people are shopping for food differently today than they were a decade ago. Why the, why things have changed to such an extent, and why so many more people are health conscious? What is it about our health that's connected to food that we can't just go out and buy and eat whatever we want anymore? Not everyone is my sensitivity level, but almost everybody has something they have to avoid. I mean, we see the memes all the time. When I first figured out it was corn, I literally had a friend send me a meme saying, with the— have you seen, like, the plate of ice cubes saying, “It's the gluten free keto” whatever diet? And they sent it to me. And my first response is, “I'm allergic to that. Ice cubes are made in a plastic. I'm allergic to plastics because plastics are made from corn. I would have a reaction to a plate of ice cubes.” That's the thing is, we don't know. Like, we make fun of all these people who have to take keto diets or their sugar-free diets or. What we're missing is that there is a actual health reason for that to happen. And because of how far we've taken our food away from being natural, we're so much more dependent on lab created foods, more people are getting sick. And unfortunately, the meds to help you, “help you,” are made from the same ingredients. So like I can't take any medications. Like there's nothing—like when I get a migraine, I have to suffer. There is nothing I can take to help my migraine, because vitamins— vitamins and supplements and all medications are all derived from corn. Everything.

Elin Barton:

Wow. What about, like, a natural? Like a, I don't know, like, essential oils or something homeopathic. Can you do that?

Amy Graves:

I'm going to be honest, essential oils, in my book are the modern snake oil. I am allergic to essential oils...

Elin Barton:

You are?

Amy Graves:

...which tells you they're not truly essential oils. And essential oils, by definition, should be only made from, say, like you want a rose essential oil. Should only be made from rose. There should be nothing else in it. And yet we're adding corn byproducts to our essential oils, which means they're no longer essential. You're adding additional chemicals to your essential oils. So no. And that's the big problem. Because of my super sensitivity, I can't take those risks, right? I live in California, man. I have CBD everywhere, but I can't take any of it because it's all contaminated with, at some level, with corn. Whether it be produced in plastic, is additional ingredients.“Inactive ingredients,” my foot.[Laughs]

Elin Barton:

Wow.

Amy Graves:

Inactive ingredients still, can still make you sick. [Laughs]

Elin Barton:

Yeah. Well, you told me at one point you, I believe, moved to California partly to access, like, farmers markets year round and be able to feed yourself, which is.

Amy Graves:

Yeah, I can’t shop at a grocery store. Like, literally, like, if I go. I go to a local Sprouts, where I can find imported cheeses, because I can't use cheese typically made in the United States. I have a safe box of crackers that, I'm going to say, “safe”? Like it's, it's something.

Elin Barton:

Mm-hmm.

Amy Graves:

It took me a decade to find safe yeast because yeast is made on corn, so I can't even find safe yeast. So it's took a decade. I finally started making bread a year ago. Found a nice safe yeast. I had a sourdough starter I could use, and I have safe flour, which, you know, the key ingredients. It's crazy. Like, I just, all of that is just, yeah. I live in California, and I moved from Minnesota, like the capital of corn.[Laughs] Okay, well, maybe that's Nebraska, but it’s our number one export in Minnesota.[Laughs]

Elin Barton:

Oh, interesting. But it's, so like, bringing this all together. You know, as you stated several times, you're kind of a special case because you're so sensitive, but that said, there's all these other people that are, you know, needing to be ultra careful because, they, their illnesses derive from, you know, either corn or something. And, and so there's need to educate the, the, food suppliers and, and I want to say food manufacturers, but that doesn't sound right. But there's need to educate about, like, labeling and, transparency around their processes and all of that. Correct?

Amy Graves:

Yeah. Well, in a big part of it for, like, the, for businesses is, you know, whatever part they are in the food chain of how either they're in the lab or they're selling it on the other end is, you still have legal requirements. And what I'm saying to do isn't avoid legal requirements. It's like ADA. Your, your requirements that the government requires of you are the bare minimum. It’s the bare minimum to not get sued. Right? You need to at least hit that bar. What I'm doing is telling people you need to go above the bar if you're going to start including more people to find all of your ideal clients.

Elin Barton:

Your, kind of like your own quest started with this food situation, but I also really appreciate and admire how the hidden consumer fits in with what we started talking about at the beginning with making your website accessible, making your location accessible. You know, there's a lot of people that need that, that you might not never, ever know that they do by just looking at them. They, you know, don't necessarily have a voice or like, you might not know unless you start to ask the right questions.

Amy Graves:

And you know what's interesting is I don't think most people know how to ask those right questions because they don't know that that exists.

Elin Barton:

Right.

Amy Graves:

So like the client I want to work with in the food industry, I'm not going to be working for Nestlé. Nestlé could, Nestlé doesn't care if I can't eat their product, and they don't want to find people like me to buy their product, right? I'm not the ideal client. But you do have a group of people and companies that created their product to be healthier, to be that next level. They're, they don't want to be Nestlé, M&M or any of the big food companies. They, they want to create a product that attracts people because of their own issues. Maybe they're allergic to nuts. So they created this great, you know, nut-free product, but they can't reach them. And they can't reach them because they don't understand all the reasons people need to go nut free. It's not just allergies. There's so many other things that people need to take in consideration that, until you get someone who can understand that and help you, you can't write even your marketing copy, if you don't understand what people are looking for. So how do you ask those right questions if you don't know what you need to look for to begin with?

Elin Barton:

Mmm. Yeah. That makes, that makes a lot of sense. Yeah. So you're almost like this—I shouldn't say almost. You are this catalyst for change and really rippling out, you know. I know you're just getting started with your Hidden Consumers project. Let's call it a project. But, you know, really, when we talk about impacts, it's easy to see how you're going to make a huge impact. And I'm just curious, like for you, how do you define or think about impact?

Amy Graves:

Impact for me is you have a, you make a positive change on the world around you. I am looking to change the world, but I also understand my positive impact is day to day with the people I have regular interactions with. So one more person I talked to and got the message out to is one more person that's going to step back and say, “Wait, I need to do this differently?” Or “Wait, what happened there?” Right? Like it's going to make them stop. It's going to make them pause. That's the positive impact. I mean, I want to change the world. I want websites to accurately talk about what is in all the ingredients. I know you don't legally have to, but if you want consumers to buy your product and maybe they're right there on the edge and they're your hidden consumer, the more value you provide, the more likely they are to buy your product. So how do we do that? Because we can't get it all on a label, like...[Laughs]...we're not going to put this on a little package, like. It's going to have to be connected to your website, and we're gonna have to find ways to really get that message out to people. So that's, that's the impact. The impact is day to day, how do we spread the message, and then who will actually take that step up and be a leader in their industry to make those changes?

Elin Barton:

Mmm. So, it's so exciting. It's really exciting to witness your journey. You know, I really mean that. And look forward to watching what happens when this book comes out and, you know, all the things that are going to come after that. So, with that said, how can people find the book and find you and connect with you? Tell us everything.

Amy Graves:

I'm so excited about this book, because I keep talking about it, right?[Laughs] We are still working on some edits because my book was research-based to start with. It's really about having that conversation in the book. So it's, this is a two-part thing. Before the book comes out, I'm releasing my research in white papers, so you'll be able to see the back end of how I came to this viewpoint and why I say what I do, before you get the book. It's not for the faint of heart. My research was 80,000 words. Basically it was an 80,000-word academic paper was where I started to move the book into that conversation because I, I had to get all that research out. So that's going to be the white paper. The book itself is about that conversation and really talking through, what does that research mean? Because most people don't understand research at the level I do. And I get it. So it's, how does that impact daily life? So even if you're a consumer and you're like, “What is this all about?” You're going to be able to pick up and read the book and understand what we're trying to do in the food industry. And if you pick up the book and you go, “I know someone,”...[Laughs]...you should recommend the book to people that are in the food industry. Trust me, they need this book. So the book itself is on my website, hiddenconsumersconsulting.com. It's under “The Book” because it's going to be The Book of 2025. That's what I'm saying. And, because we, you know, we love our own stuff, right?

Elin Barton:

[Laughs]

Amy Graves:

You, you can actually preorder this almost anywhere. I recommend you go through bookshop.org and put in your local bookstore and preorder through your local bookstore. For me, I'm going to, I actually will preorder my own book because I want to support Get Lit Books in Moreno Valley, but you can order this anywhere. I'm on Amazon. You can find my author page on Amazon. I'm going to be applying for a Goodreads page as well, so you'll be able to find me there. But, Target, Barnes and Noble, they're all good at pre-ordering. You, I mean, you can pick. So there are a list. I've got ten, ten links on my book page of all the places you can preorder the book through, including the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia.

Elin Barton:

Oh, wow. Nice. And the name of the book again?

Amy Graves: “The Hidden Consumer:

Uncovering the Power of Health-Conscious Buyers.”

Elin Barton:

Okay. Wonderful. By Amy Graves.

Amy Graves:

By Amy Graves. I know. I’m an author.

Elin Barton:

You’re an author. Congratulations.

Amy Graves:

And I have a second book that it's been written and it's been written for like six years, and I have yet to publish it. So we'll see how this one goes. Maybe the second book will come up faster.[Laughs]

Elin Barton:

Okay, well, that's a whole other conversation, but that sounds very interesting and look forward to that one as well. But thank you, Amy, for taking the time to talk with us about accessibility, food issues, corn, impact, making your voice heard, getting access to all the things that all people should be able to access and enjoy. It's really interesting, inspiring, the work that you're doing. And I loved this conversation. Thank you.

Amy Graves:

This was fun. This was my favorite interview. I loved this. [Laughs]

Elin Barton:

Your favorite interview? Wow. Wow. That's fantastic. Thank you.[electronic music concludes]

Emily Adams:

And now here's our Impact Tip of the Month. It's okay not to know everything, as long as you're taking small steps to learn. Consider courses on accessibility that are relevant to your business, such as the many web accessibility courses you can find on sites like Udemy, Coursera, or edX.[music fades up] Thanks for listening and make sure to do good in the world this month. If you have questions you'd like us to address on the podcast, you can reach us at info@riveocreative.com. Subscribe wherever you listen so you don't miss out on any of our incredible upcoming guests. We'll see you soon at the Riveo Impact Lab.[electronic music][electronic music concludes]

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Elin Barton

Co-host
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Emily Adams

Co-host
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Amy Graves

Guest