Max Anderson has been recognized with a 2026 Global Recognition Award for building original, freely accessible research into contaminants in the American food supply, and the work places him in the research category. Microplastics.org, which he founded in 2024, aims to test every major food and beverage brand in the country and to publish the rankings without charge. The project draws on an operating record that took Anderson from intern to executive at Porch Group and later to an eight-figure business of his own.

Research Built for Public Use

Microplastics.org tests major food and beverage brands for microplastics and related contaminants, including bisphenols, phthalates, and PFAS, and it publishes the results as free rankings. Anderson treats brand-level testing as a public dataset rather than a private commission, which lets consumers, journalists, and regulators compare products side by side. That design is original in a field where most testing is paid for by a single client and kept out of public view.

The work earned a 5 out of 5 for originality in research methodology and for potential real-world application, and the scores match the project’s practical purpose. Few efforts attempt a survey of every major brand, and fewer still release their findings without a fee, so the rankings provide shoppers information they could not otherwise obtain. Anderson’s decision to publish openly turns laboratory results into guidance that people can use at the grocery shelf, and that practical use is the center of the project’s value.

Operating Record Behind the Research

Anderson joined Porch Group in 2013 as an intern and rose to the executive team, where he reported to the chief executive and led product and demand generation. He helped raise a personal syndicate to invest in the Series A, and he stayed through the 2020 Nasdaq listing before retiring in 2021 as annual recurring revenue passed $150 million. Porch has since grown beyond $500 million, a figure that shows the size of the organization he helped build.

He also co-founded and sold two bootstrapped ventures, Production Grower and Spilled, and in 2021 he acquired OnlyFinder, which had traffic but no meaningful revenue or business model. Anderson folded it into his ad network and grew the combined business to eight figures in annual revenue, now increasing about 40 percent a year, with hundreds of integrated partner sites worldwide. That international reach, together with his investments in Fathers, Kin, Jasper, Beehiiv, Gumloop, Cal.com, Kittl, and Noetica, supports his scores of 5 for international collaboration, interdisciplinary work, and published features.

Final Words

Max Anderson combines commercial results with a research project aimed at a widespread consumer concern, and Microplastics.org gives the public free, brand-by-brand information on contaminants that few people can test for themselves. A panel of industry experts, chosen for their expertise and impartiality, screens all nominations, and shortlisted applicants are evaluated with the Rasch model, which creates a linear measurement scale for each category and allows precise comparisons between applicants who excel in different areas. Anderson rated 5 in every research criterion he submitted, and colleagues such as Asha Sharma, chief executive of Xbox, and Joanna Lord, founder of Neon Palm, describe the same strengths in problem solving and execution.

Alex Sterling, a spokesperson for Global Recognition Awards, said, “Max Anderson has shown that careful research can be built for public benefit, and his originality, international reach, and focus on real-world application are why he has won a 2026 Global Recognition Award.” His work shows how a founder’s operating experience can be applied to open, practical research, and its open publication model sets it apart in the field. Anderson now has the opportunity to extend that approach across the food and beverage industry, and the rankings will grow more useful with each brand added.