We are Jeff Wolovitz and Maho Hisakawa. We started Heiwa Tofu 8 years ago and over the years our team has expanded to include three employees and our two young daughters, Ina and Ami. We believe a local, plant-based diet is one way to a more peaceful planet. Heiwa means peace in Japanese and we have come to think of Heiwa tofu as "Peace On Your Plate."
First time Heiwa customers quickly become dedicated and loyal Heiwa fans. Some even admit they never liked tofu until they tried Heiwa. We think it’s a combination of the creamy texture, great taste and the freshness.
We put lots of care into every batch of tofu we make. On any given day, we make 600-700 pounds of tofu. Since opening in 2008, we’ve sold close to 400,000 pounds of tofu. That's about 10 million happy bitefuls of Heiwa Tofu! Jeff thinks that's a lot of responsibility to carry and approaches his production work with great care. Heiwa Tofu uses only organic, non-GMO soybeans and works directly with a number of Maine farmers. In fact, over the past 8 years, about 80% of our soybeans were Maine grown.
We are here for the long haul. Our goal is to be sustainable, for not just the business and the bottom line, but for our family, our employees, our customers, and our community. Earlier this year we put basically everything we had into buying and renovating our new beanery at 201 West Street in Rockport, Maine. We needed more space and greater stability. The result was a rugged industrial/manufacturing facility with the watertightness of a seafaring vessel and the cleanliness of an operating room. All 1600 square feet of the beanery gets used pretty hard every day. We also hired three new employees.![]()
As we budgeted and designed the facility last winter, we knew money would be tight. We made cuts wherever we could. One decision was that since we were moving in June, we could put off a heating and cooling system until later. We would sweat it out for the first summer (which we did!) and would have until late fall before we really needed building heat, which is critical to operations. Now Jack Frost is at the door and we need the system installed. We need your help. The campaign goal is to raise $15,000 for the purchase and installation of highly efficient electric, air-to-air heat exchangers (heat pumps).
We also really want to involve our community in helping us spread the good word about Heiwa Tofu. There are still a lot of people in the state and in our region who don’t know there’s a Maine company making small batch, organic tofu and that it’s available in many natural food and grocery stores, restaurants, colleges, hospitals and other cafeterias throughout Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and even little beyond. For a list of many of the places to buy or eat Heiwa Tofu, visit: http://www.heiwatofu.com and click on "Where To Find It."
If you’re interested in finding out more information about Heiwa Tofu we’re super easy to find online. If you type “Maine tofu” into a search engine, we come right up. Visit www.facebook.com/mainetofu and like us for campaign updates. Better yet, come visit us in Rockport. Our new production facility is awesome. We’re so proud of it, and we love to show it off.
Thank you for purchasing, eating, cooking, and sharing our tofu and for your continued support. And thank you to all of our team members for helping us all along the way to get to where we are today. We wouldn't be here without you.
As a thank you, we have prepared many fun perks! We have Heiwa canvas tote bags and soft, comfortable Heiwa T-shirts. There are tofu coupons for locals and shipped tofu for those of you further away. Inspired by this campaign, we've even made an exclusive Heiwa Kitchen Recipe Book just for you. And as you might have noticed, we have plenty of little Heiwa stickers to decorate your notebook or anywhere else you'd like!
