Want Healthy Office Treats That Taste Like Dessert? Meet Realsy

What sounds like a health food but tastes like dessert? In our humble opinion, it’s got to be nut butter-filled dates from realsy. They’re healthy office treats that are both super-sweet and nutrient-dense, with just a few ingredients.

Though the snacks are simple, the story of how realsy got started (and partnered with The FruitGuys to deliver its snacks to offices) is a little more complicated. It begins at Texas Christian University, bounces across the country, and finally lands at a special date farm in Mexico.

We sat down with realsy Co-founder Sophia Karbowski to get the full picture. She started by telling us something a little wild: If she hadn’t made a mistake in college, realsy might never have come to be.

This College Mistake Changed Everything

When Sophia was a student at Texas Christian University, she signed up for the wrong class (in management instead of marketing). If she hadn’t, she’d never have met her future business partner, Austin Patry.

Austin and Sophia quickly discovered two shared passions: entrepreneurship and food. Sophia grew up eating delicious, home-cooked meals made by her foodie dad and Middle Eastern grandparents. Meanwhile, Austin spent his childhood in his parents’ French restaurant in Dallas.

“We had similar interests, and in class together we bonded over that and over the fact that there weren’t a lot of convenient, healthy food options near campus,” Sophia told The FruitGuys.

After graduation, the pair joined forces to start a food truck called Rollin’ n Bowlin’ at TCU. They sold healthy snacks like smoothies, acai bowls, and avocado toast. The business was such a hit that they eventually opened a brick-and-mortar location and started expanding to other college campuses. Then, the COVID-19 pandemic arrived.

The Pivot: From Smoothies to Stuffed Dates

The COVID-19 lockdowns temporarily closed Rollin’ n Bowlin’s shops, so Sophia and Austin pivoted to smoothie pouches packed in dry ice for home delivery. But soon, a realization hit: They were more excited about packaged snacks than they were about smoothies.

The pair set off on a quest to create a shelf-stable bite that would meet their high health standards. Dates—which Sophia grew up eating with her Middle Eastern family—were just catching on at the time.

“Dates have blown up in the US because they’re such a nutrient-dense, delicious fruit with a sugary caramel taste,” Sophia said, adding that she and Austin had a lightbulb moment when stuffed date recipes began to go viral. “We wanted to see a produce-focused snack [like that] in the marketplace and make it easier to take on the go.”

With realsy, they did just that! Their dates filled with almond butter, peanut butter, or chocolate peanut butter are individually wrapped and mess-free, so they’re great as healthy office treats. They’re made from just a few real ingredients—three or four at most—without added sugar.

Fresh Ingredients Straight from the Farm

Realsy works directly with farmers in California and Mexico to source its dates, peanuts, almonds, and cacao. For Sophie, that’s about more than good flavor.

“I think nowadays it’s just tough to know where your food is coming from, especially if it’s a packaged snack, since there are so many ingredients on the market now that are made up of tons of other ingredients, and they don’t have to disclose them on the label. For us, we really want to be transparent about where everything is coming from,” she said.

Realsy’s stuffed dates are actually assembled on a family-run date farm in Mexico. Austin and Sophia send their nut butters (made with “special recipes”) and packaging to the farm, and the farmers do the rest.

“The date farmers are sorting the dates, washing the dates, pitting the dates, filling them, and packing them,” Sophia said. “… They employ over 80% working mothers on their farm, which is really awesome.”

How to Order realsy’s Healthy Office Treats

Here at The FruitGuys, we love adding realsy’s Peanut Butter Dates, Chocolate Peanut Butter Dates, and Almond Butter Dates to our office snack boxes, which feature a wide variety of nutritious snacks that rotate each week. We also make bulk office snack deliveries for break room restocks and office celebrations! Just click that link to browse the bulk options available in your region, then place your bulk snack order.