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Each year the National Lentil Festival partners with our friends at USA Pulses to bring you leading industry experts, live cooking demos featuring your favorite Tase T. legume, Panelist Q & A's, a Lil' Lentil Royal Coronation and more!
Check back soon for more details and join us August 16 in the heart of Reaney Park at our Gazebo Stage, proudly brought to you by Toyota of Pullman at this year's National Lentil Festival!
Pulse Panelists
Tim McGreevy
Tim D. McGreevy is the CEO of the USA Pulses Coalition which includes the USA Dry Pea and Lentil Council (USADPLC), U.S.A Pulses Trade Association, The Pulse Foundation and the following state pulse organizations in WA, ID, MT, ND, SD and NE. The mission of USA Pulses is to double U.S. pulse crop consumption and production.
In his role as the CEO of USA Pulses, Tim is responsible for international and domestic market development, research, policy development, and expanding the pulse crop coalition.
McGreevy serves as Chairman of the Finance Committee of the Global Pulse Confederation (GPC), an international organization representing the global pulse crop value chain.
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Ben Bacon
Ben Bacon is the founder of Lentiful, a brand on a mission to help Americans eat more plant-based foods—starting with lentils. Lentiful makes it ridiculously easy (and delicious) to enjoy this humble superfood, with globally inspired lentil cups that cook in just one minute. Since launching less than three years ago, the brand has landed in over 1,500 stores nationwide—including Whole Foods, Wegmans, and Walmart—and picked up wins at the Naturally National Pitch Slam, NOSH Pitch Slam, and NEXTY Awards. When he’s not spreading the lentil love, Ben’s usually outside exploring Colorado with his wife and their four adventurous kids.
Kyle Hinrichs
Kyle Hinrichs is the General Manager of Pulses at Columbia Grain International, overseeing operations at their Washington State pulse plant and collaborating with the organization team and marketers. Kyle has over 15 years of experience in the pulse industry, particularly with chickpeas.
Kyle is actively involved in the U.S. Pulse community, sitting on various committees and boards within USA Pulses.
Chelsea Didinger
Chelsea Didinger has a PhD in Nutrition from Colorado State University, where her translational research focused on increasing consumer intake of beans and other pulses through mitigating barriers to consumption and emphasizing motivating factors. As part of her doctoral work, she shared widely the numerous benefits and innovative uses of beans/pulses to advance public health. She is the Global Nutritional Specialist for the US Dry Bean Council, an organization that promotes bean trade and consumption globally. In this role, she travels domestically and internationally to better understand global trends in bean consumption and innovation and to present about the multi-faceted benefits of incorporating more beans into the diet.
Chelsea also founded and operates the informational outreach platform A Legume a Day, partnering with organizations, researchers, farmers, processors, Extension and others to share bean science, recipe ideas to use this important plant protein, and more.
Thank you to our 2025 Gazebo Stage Sponsor:
