About
OUR STORY
Once Upon a Flock
It began the way all the best stories do —
with a daughter, a flock, and a question
no one had thought to ask.
THE BEGINNING
In a backyard in Cincinnati, a small flock of hens scratched and foraged beneath the old maple trees. They were loved — deeply, daily — the way only a family can love their birds. Fresh water. Clean coop. Warm light on winter mornings.
But something was missing.
The feed they ate — the same pellets every backyard keeper buys — was fine. Technically complete. Nutritionally adequate. But when you watched the hens eat it, there was no joy in it. No curiosity. No spark of that natural foraging instinct that makes a hen a hen. Just a beak in a bowl, day after day, eating what amounted to compressed dust sprayed with vitamins.
Jeanette watched her flock and thought: we can do better than this.
THE SPARK
It started in the kitchen. Jeanette’s daughter had an idea — simple, wild, obvious in the way only a child’s idea can be: What if we made spaghetti for the chickens?
Not human spaghetti, of course. But real pasta — made with real ingredients, formulated for hens. With the vitamins and minerals and omega-3s they need woven right into the recipe, not sprayed on afterward. Something they could peck and pull and forage through. Something that honored the way a hen was born to eat.
And so Jeanette went to work. She studied poultry nutrition — omega ratios, calcium bioavailability, amino acid profiles — with the same intensity she brought to everything she loved. She sourced ingredients: soy-free, corn-free, traceable, real. She built recipes in her Cincinnati kitchen, tested them on her own flock, watched their feathers brighten and their eggs glow with deep golden yolks.
The hens didn’t just eat it.
They ran for it.
That was the moment Happy Chicks Feed was born — not from a business plan, but from a flock of hens racing across the yard toward a bowl of handmade pasta, their wings half-spread, their voices loud with joy.
OUR PHILOSOPHY
Smart Magic
We believe in two things that most people think are opposites: enchantment and science.
The enchantment is in the watching — a hen discovering something new in her bowl, tilting her head, calling her sisters over to share. The way a flock settles into contentment after a good meal. The deep amber of an egg laid by a truly nourished hen.
The science is in every recipe — carefully formulated omega-3 ratios, balanced calcium and phosphorus, complete amino acid profiles, prebiotics for gut health. Every ingredient is chosen with intention. Every batch is tested. Nothing is sprayed on. Everything is baked in.
Magic you can see. Science you can trust.
WHAT MAKES US DIFFERENT
Not Pellets. Not Scratch. Something New.
REAL INGREDIENTS
Handmade pasta, real grains, whole seeds, and dried herbs — not extruded pellets sprayed with synthetic vitamins. You can see every ingredient. Your hens can taste the difference.
ENRICHMENT-FIRST
Our feeds are designed to stimulate natural foraging behavior. Hens peck, pull, sort, and explore — the way nature intended. A fed hen is fine. An enriched hen is thriving.
SMALL-BATCH
Every batch is made by hand in Cincinnati, Ohio. Soy-free. Corn-free. No fillers. No shortcuts. We make what we feed our own flock — and we wouldn’t have it any other way.
GIVING BACK
The Happy Chicks Foundation
Ten percent of every Happy Chicks Feed purchase goes directly to the Happy Chicks Foundation — a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to community food security, urban farming education, and youth micro-enterprise programs in Cincinnati.
Because happy hens are just the beginning. We believe in a world where every family has access to fresh food, every child understands where their meals come from, and every community has the tools to grow something beautiful.
Learn more at happychicksfoundation.org
FROM OUR FLOCK TO YOURS
Every egg tells a story.
Every flock deserves a fairy tale.
This is ours.
Happy Chicks Feed™
SMALL-BATCH · CINCINNATI, OHIO · EST. 2025