As students at Georgetown University in Washington D.C. in 2007, three sons from entrepreneurial families identified a problem: there was no healthy place to eat in D.C. So Nicolas Jammet, Nathaniel Ru and Jonathan Neman wrote a business plan, rented out a small tavern and started selling salads with locally sourced ingredients — usually from that week's farmer's market.
With help from friends, family and a couple early investors including restaurateur Joseph Bastianich (under whom Jammet once interned) and Honest Tea founder Seth Goldman (where Nic's twin brother is the director of field marketing), Sweetgreen was born.

Good connections and a supportive network aside, the three founders' second Sweetgreen location was struggling for business. The founders had the opportunity to take a gamble and run their fledgling restaurant business more like a startup instead, and they latched on to an outside-the-box solution: loud music.
That loud music eventually turned into a block party of 500 people, where the group handed out samples and educated customers on healthy living. That first block party later transformed into the annual Sweetlife Festival, headlined by the likes of Phoenix, Passion Pit and Kendrick Lamar last May.

Immediately, Sweetgreen became a lifestyle brand deadset on connecting passion with purpose with a zest for life, and social media was a perfect avenue through which to convey that message.
With 12,000 Twitter followers, 11,000 Instagram followers and nearly 20,000 likes on Facebook, the Sweetgreen social team shares a healthy dose of food porn, beats from new music and artists, yoga and exercise tips, and cool projects from other sustainable brands. A recent rallying cry on social media has been, "Beets don't kale my vibe," a playful riff on a Kendrick Lamar lyric. The goal isn't necessarily to sell salads during the lunch rush, but inspiring them to live a life of passion and healthfulness, in which salads hopefully play a role.

For Sweetgreen, their business model isn't just about being a place to eat. It's about connecting with people through good food, great music and generous causes.
Check out the video above to hear how the team built their now 21-store farm-to-table experience by connecting passionate people to sustainable food, and spreading their message via social media.