How this startup founder earned $200K in unrestricted, trust-based funding to transform KC’s relationship to food

Long-term community change comes one meal at a time, acknowledged one of Attane Health’s biggest supporters, reflecting on the Kansas City startup’s growth from the “spark of an idea to a full-fledged solution” — ultimately earning its founder a game-changing funding boost.

The St. Louis-based Missouri Foundation for Health this month announced its inaugural Spark Prize winners, which included a $200,000 award for Emily Brown, who launched what is now Attane Health in 2021. (She was nominated for the honor by Dr. Bridget McCandless, a city council member for Independence, Missouri, and the former CEO of the Health Forward Foundation.)

Emily Brown, Attane Health

“This award will allow me to deepen my work and dream even bigger,” said Brown.

Informed by Brown’s lived experience, Attane Health is a digital health company built in the “food as medicine” space to drive food and nutrition care into the healthcare delivery system. The startup boasts its own food treatment marketplace, as well as education and training resources, and data analytics.

“Healthcare is the industry that has the most to gain, along with the ability to support patients’ access to healthy, new food treatments,” Brown, a caregiver, former health care practitioner and former Medicaid recipient, told Startland News in May. “It also has the most to gain when those health outcomes improve and ultimately lower the cost of care.”

The Spark Prize supports individuals leading transformative work to improve health, advance equity, and strengthen communities across Missouri. It provides unrestricted, trust-based funding to individuals, not organizations, giving them the freedom to pursue their vision in the way that best serves their communities.

“Now in its inaugural year, the Spark Prize was created to recognize and amplify individuals addressing the root causes of poor health and developing innovative, community-based solutions,” according to an award announcement. “It’s not a lifetime achievement award — it’s fuel for what’s next.”

Selected from a highly competitive pool of more than 170 nominations, Brown was recognized alongside four other individuals for their bold leadership and potential to drive long-term impact.

Click here to read full bios of the winners.

Emily Brown, Attane Health, speaks during a May 2025 Startland News Innovation Exchange event, presented by Morgan Stanley at Spark Coworking; photo by Taylor Wilmore, Startland News

While her work begins at the ground level, Brown admits it requires change at the national policymaker level and within entrenched health care systems, she said.

“But we have an opportunity to address this problem through a commercial approach — and to do it at scale with quality and sustainability,” she said. “My team is focused on driving the policy that will shape that market opportunity. It takes building evidence and having critical conversations around a reimbursement structure for food and nutrition.”

“Nothing happens in healthcare unless, one, it’s a mandate; or two, it saves them money or makes them money,” Brown continued.

Click here to learn more about the journey of Attane Health, a KCRise Fund portfolio company that was named one of Startland News’ Kansas City Startups to Watch in 2023 (then called Free From Market).

At Attane Health’s core is a belief in the dignity and psychology of choice, she emphasized.

“Food, while it is there to nourish us, also is part of who we are,” Brown said. “Culturally, we celebrate around the table. We gather around the table. Business deals happen around the table. And we know that food is so much more for us than nourishment, which means we have to meet people where they are.”