Ari Nessel

Ari Nessel is a real estate developer in the Bay Area. As president of Nessel Development, Ari oversees the acquisition and improvement of properties including people-centric renovation, planet-saving materials and profit-generating business practices. Ari focuses his attention on locating, structuring and negotiating acquisitions and adding value to those properties through renovations, energy savings, and managerial improvements.

After making a fortune in Dallas real estate, and “struggl[ing] as I tried to reconcile my desire to bring more compassion and consciousness to this often sad world with my efforts to create personal wealth as a real estate developer,” Ari committed to give back. Yet he noticed that modern-day philanthropy tends to hold a disconnect between the funders and those who are doing the work. So he decided to seed projects rather than fund them, and has embarked on an experiment to give away $1,000 a day, every day, for the rest of his life. "My experience is that transformation happens on the fringes and in the micro areas and the individuals," he explains. "It doesn't happen on a large scale, it happens through all these people coming together in communities."

So even as he continues his real estate development work in the Bay Area, Ari founded and has become president of The Pollination Project, which makes $1000 seed grants and loans daily to individual change-makers to make their communities and their world a better place. The Pollination Project focuses on passionate individuals working for the benefit of people, planet and animals in areas like environmental sustainability, social justice and community health and wellness. Since it started on January 1, 2013, the Project has provided funding to nearly 1000 seed grants in 55 countries. Its grantees have gone on to win prestigious awards, be featured in international news outlets, and gain additional financial support. “Many of them say that it was our belief in them that helped their project grow,” Ari says.

After an epiphany in 1997 changed the way Ari related to food, his heart opened up to the impact every person’s life has on countless beings and the world at large. Soon after this insight, Ari began his journey, which has culminated in the Pollination Project and in Ari’s devotion to a life of non-violence in the broadest sense of the word. He supports the practice of non-violence, as well as his business efforts, through a consistent practice of hatha yoga, meditation and veganism (not eating any animal flesh or by-products). Outside of work, Ari teaches yoga and meditation, and has been featured in Yoga Journal. He lives in the Bay Area, CA with his wife, a doctor who cares for underserved populations, their two young sons, a dog and several chickens. Ari teaches meditation and yoga workshops and strives to spread more compassion and generosity in the world.