Our Founder

Julie Mendel Reinhard founded the Safe Food Label Alliance, Inc. out of personal conviction — as a devoted mother of a son with food allergies, she experienced firsthand the anxiety and uncertainty that comes with unclear food labeling. That experience drove her to become one of the country's most dedicated advocates for food allergen transparency.

Her advocacy career spans more than two decades of meaningful legislative impact. She worked alongside the Center for Science in the Public Interest to champion the Food Allergen Labeling and Consumer Protection Act of 2004 — a landmark law that transformed how allergens are disclosed on food packaging. She later contributed to the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2015, which requires food manufacturers using any of the nine major allergens to implement additional safety controls to prevent unintended cross-contamination. The work of SFLA now is to advocate for mandatory precautionary allergen labeling (PAL) that protects all food allergic consumers, including the most highly sensitive ones.

Julie holds an undergraduate degree from Brown University and a JD from Washington University in St. Louis, where she served as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Urban and Contemporary Law. Julie is the mother of two sons and lives in Bethesda, Maryland with her husband, two cats and a dog.