About Vegan Outreach
Vegan Outreach is a 501c3 nonprofit organization working to end violence towards animals. We seek a future when sentient animals are no longer exploited as commodities.
We focus on reaching the people who are motivated enough to make changes now—of which there are always many in our target audience who just need some guidance.
By steadily increasing the number of vegans, we’re laying the groundwork to reach a tipping point in which sweeping public policy changes for animals will become realistic.
Founded in 1993, we’ve been most known for our massive outreach program of leafleting on college campuses. At its peak, we were handing booklets to over 1 million students at 1,000 schools per semester.
10 Weeks to Vegan
Based on research showing that veg challenges are highly effective ways to facilitate change, we refocused our college outreach from handing out booklets to signing people up for our 10 Weeks to Vegan with over 150,000 signups in 2019.
The pandemic required that we move our outreach online. By increasing our advertising on social media more than 1.1 million people have signed up for 10 Weeks to Vegan since the beginning of 2020.
We now have 59 different 10 Weeks to Vegan series tailored to 55 countries and regions:
We advertise the program in 52 countries (we don’t run ads in Russia, Belarus, or Ukraine).
Support for Making Changes
Our regional 10 Weeks to Vegan programs have companion Facebook groups with moderators and a dietitian to answer questions. Over 5,000 people join these groups each month.
We also provide nutrition support from registered dietitians via VeganHealth.org and our 30-day Get Healthy challenge using whole plant foods.
For more personal guidance, we have a vegan mentorship program with mentors in over 1,000 cities and dozens of countries.
Vegan Chef Challenges
In 2022, we reignited the Vegan Chef Challenge program. These month-long events showcase new vegan menu items at local non-vegan restaurants. Typically, 10 to 30 restaurants take part and the dining public is encouraged to vote for their favorite dishes.
Vegan Chef Challenges create a positive buzz about veganism in areas that don’t normally have many options with the majority of restaurants retaining their most popular vegan items.
The challenges receive positive media coverage, such as for our July 2022 Albuquerque challenge with 30 participating venues (Vegan Chef Challenge invites community to help end animal cruelty) and for our May of 2023 Amarillo challenge that received no less than eight news segments on Channel 4 KMAR!
Green Tuesday Initiative
Our Green Tuesday Initiative works with institutions to add vegan options and decrease their animal product usage in India. We’ve helped 33 educational institutions and corporate offices implement more sustainable food policies and reduce large quantities of animal products from their menus.
Measuring Our Effectiveness
Vegan Outreach aims to be as effective as possible by regularly studying the impact of our outreach. Detailed in our article, Impact of 10 Weeks to Vegan, the program results in a high rate of change. We’re now in the midst of conducting a randomized controlled study of the effectiveness of 10 Weeks to Vegan.
A Big Tent
Vegan Outreach believes in never shaming people but rather embracing them in making changes at a pace that works for them.
Rather than focusing our veganism on personal purity or trace ingredients, we put the emphasis on avoiding obvious animal products while using our time and energy advocating to others—see Talking to Friends and Family.
Vegan Outreach strives to hire a diverse staff and to place women and people of color in leadership positions.
