My Story

 

From our family to yours…
My wife and I are first-generation immigrants in the United States and second-generation mushroom cultivators. We have two kids Abigail and John and with their presence in our lives, building our own business and leaving a legacy for our kids became a priority for us and fueled us to find a way to start our local small business.
My wife and I always had entrepreneurial spirits and wanted to have a business where we were in control of our own products to grow them in a responsible way. However, life got in our way and we both had jobs and had to work to provide for our family. Then Covid hit and I lost my job. Sometimes an ending is a beginning.
My father-in-law who is a biologist in Turkey who started growing mushrooms in the ’80s taught me from scratch how to grow them in a manual setting over the years. I have truly fallen in love with everything exotic mushrooms have to offer from the taste, texture, and many health benefits. As an avid reader, I read many articles that talked about the growing evidence that mushrooms can help the environment such as absorbing carbon.
We built our own local business “Thrive Mushrooms”. We sell our mushrooms in select farmers' markets. We are located in the south suburbs and currently looking for opportunities to further expand our business in different parts of the city to introduce our local mushrooms to different communities and teach people all the wonderful benefits mushrooms offer.
We pledge to donate a portion of the proceeds from each sale to “Autism Speaks”; an organization that is dedicated to promoting solutions, across the spectrum and throughout the life-span, for the needs of individuals with autism and their families.

Thank you for supporting local, family-owned businesses.