While in San Francisco this past week Veggiest was able to take a trip to the beautiful headquarters of VegNews magazine. For those of you unfamiliar, VegNews is the premier (and only completely vegan) vegetarian publication on the shelves right now. What sets VegNews apart, aside from their fabulous staff of course, is that they seek to promote the entire vegetarian lifestyle and offer informative stories on a wide variety of veg topics.

The VegNews staff was kind enough to roll out the red er, green carpet for my visit and treated me to a delicious vegan lunch. Read all about it on their blog and check back often to see what yummy meals the staff is cooking up each day.

My interview with the VegNews founders after the jump!

After my belly was pleasantly full from the vegan ice creams we sampled, I sat down to discuss vegetarian media with Publisher Joe Connelly and Associate Publisher Colleen Holland, the founders of VegNews magazine. They gave me some background at first, detailing how VN started as a free tabloid-style publication in 2000 and became a full glossy mag in 2004. The brainchild of Joe and Colleen, it was apparent in our discussion how passionate they are about their project and also how proud they are of the magazine's success. Joe and Colleen took a "if you build it they will come philosophy" to the magazine, assuming correctly that if they did things the 'right' way - independently and organically - that they would attract a following. While it wasn't always easy taking the high-road so to speak, the efforts have paid off in the superior publication they are able to offer their committed readers. The best news is that the readership is hopefully about to grow as VegNews was just picked up to be carried in the chain of Safeway stores. Considering the typical constituency of Safeway, this is a big step in getting out the Veg message to a broader audience.

Inspired by their passion and drive, I left the VegNews offices not only happy and full from the fine food and conversation, but even more committed to spreading the word about compassionate and green living.

Stay tuned to the column in the upcoming weeks when Veggiest will be reviewing two of the many amazing vegan restaurants of San Francisco.

Special thanks again to Colleen, Joe, and the rest of the amazing VegNews staff for their hospitality