Company History  |  Our Mission
Principals:  Ray Basa, President and Co-Founder  |  Violeta D. Cristobal, CFO and Co-Founder

History

Ray Basa and Vee Cristobal founded The Healthy Bean in 2003 in Los Angeles, California. Ray Basa’s entire family, MJay Basa, Maria Basa, Reynaldo Basa and Grace Basa, collaborated on The Healthy Bean concept, serving as the tasting panel, business development and creative team, making The Healthy Bean truly a family business. The founders have more than 50 years of combined experience in business and food technology and have individually distinguished themselves in their respective fields of expertise. Vee is an accomplished accountant and runs her own CPA firm. Ray is a chemist/food scientist and operates his own food product development and consulting company.

The Healthy Bean team advocates a balanced and active lifestyle. Vee runs marathons and 10Ks and has won many awards. Ray is a scuba diving master instructor and is affiliated with the largest scuba diving certification agency in the world.

Vee and Ray believe that in order to stay at the top of their fields, proper nutrition must be a vital component of their daily diet. Being leaders and innovators, they decided to take matters into their own hands and launched The Healthy Bean, with the goal of creating healthy options that will satisfy discriminating palates while providing sensible nutrition.

Our Mission

The Healthy Bean strives to be the global leader in functional, nutritionally enhanced coffee and wellness products. We support wellness and a healthy lifestyle in every aspect of our business.

These are the principles which will guide us:

• Our consumers will receive the highest quality, scientifically formulated and best tasting coffee products available.
• Our coffee will be sustainably farmed, shade grown and organic. All of the coffee beans we use will be Fair-Trade certified.
• We will continuously expand our offerings and provide healthier alternatives to everyday products.
• We will persevere to give back to our communities both locally and internationally.
• We embrace and aspire to a diverse, multicultural workforce and customer base.
• We resolve to be environmentally conscious and reduce waste wherever possible.

Ray Basa
President and Co-Founder

The Healthy Bean president and co-founder Ray Basa is an accomplished food scientist with over 17 years experience developing nutritional supplements for companies such as GNC, Weider Nutrition, Atkins, Bally’s Total Fitness, and many others. Ray spent 11 years at Omni-Pak Industries, a leading developer of dietary, herbal and nutritional supplements for the consumer market, where he was director of research and development. He started his own consulting company, Quest Development, Inc., in 2001, and co-founded The Healthy Bean in 2003.

Ray was born and raised in the Philippines, and created and operates a food program for his local church in his hometown of Manila. He is a certified master scuba diving instructor and leads scuba retreats throughout the world. He received his B.S. in Chemistry from the University of Santo Tomas in the Philippines, and his Master’s degree in Food Science and Nutrition from Chapman University.

Violeta D. Cristobal, CPA
Chief Financial Officer and Co-Founder

The Healthy Bean Co-Founder and Chief Financial Officer Vee Cristobal is the President of Cristobal & Company, Certified Public Accountants and Business Consultants. She has more than 20 years of professional public accounting experience in variety of industries such as food manufacturing, import and export, wholesale and retail, home care, medical, real estate, rental properties, property management, various professional firms and non-for-profit organizations.

In addition to her business acumen, Vee is an accomplished athlete, and has competed in more than 20 marathons and shorter runs. Her enthusiasm for running and a healthy lifestyle inspired her to start The Healthy Bean, and to create products that incorporate wellness into everyday life.

A Phillipines native, Vee is dedicated to building a library in Manila, and has personally brought over 1,000 books to schools and churches in that city. She is an active member of the St. Monica Parish church community in Santa Monica, California, and is the treasurer and board director of the Filipino American Heritage Institute/Filipino American Library. Vee is the current president of the CalCPA Los Angeles Chapter, which has more than 9,000 members. She also serves as an advisor for the Philippine American Society of CPAs and volunteers her time to bring financial literacy to California schoolchildren.