Jess Mantell

Jess Mantell is the Co-Founder of Abokichi, Inc., a Japanese-inspired food company. Originally from a Toronto suburb, her fascination with cities brought her to Tokyo where she worked as a graphic designer and earned a masters degree in media design from Keio University. Abokichi was born in 2013 out of a desire to share Japanese culinary delights with western consumers, and to create a company with super high standards of quality, customer service, employee satisfaction, and social responsibility. In the last seven years Jess and her co-founder have pivoted from being a pop-up shop at farmer’s markets to a brick and mortar shop selling fresh, prepared food to, now, a manufactured food producer with products available online and in stores across Canada. As an entrepreneur, Jess believes that need to learn and grow with the challenges as they arise.