Colorfully packaged pasta, cookies and cereal line the shelves of Foods for Living, 2650 E. Grand River Ave. Alongside food products, in other aisles and on other shelves are lipsticks, household cleaners, vitamins and dog food.

It’s just like a small-scale Meijer - except very different.

At Foods for Living, shoppers won’t find brands such as Pepsi, Chef Boyardee or Kellogg. Instead, hyper-advertised, mass-market name brands are replaced with words and phrases such as “organic,” “no preservatives,” “natural” and “grown without pesticides.”

Probably the most recognizable item for the average consumer is a canister of Ghirardelli hot chocolate, which can be found near the back of the store.

Foods for Living, which has been open for more than three years, caters to health-conscious shoppers, offering a wide variety of food and other products not available at many stores.

“We focus on the total rejuvenation and maintenance of the body,” owner John Snyder said. “The main thing is eating food without chemicals or pesticides. That seems to be our main draw here.”

In between helping customers find a product or decide on which vitamins to buy, Snyder explains that after working in grocery stores for years, he became disillusioned with mass-market food companies, and as a result opened Foods for Living.

He said now he’s happy with his job because he can both work one-on-one with the customer and is confident of the safety of the products he sells.

“I think it’s making a statement and saying the contaminants, the pesticides and chemicals don’t have to be there,” Snyder said. “These foods are proof of that.”

Certifying foods as organic doesn’t mean farmers “just put the seed in and walk away,” said Steven Graye, the regional sales manager for Purity Foods Inc.

Graye said organic foods do use “items” on them to inhibit the growth of fungus, but they’re certified by a private company called Quality Assurance International, which holds food producers to very strict guidelines for safe food production.

“It’s a real high-growth industry,” Graye said. “Even though it might be a drop in the bucket when compared with regular agriculture, the growth is just incredible.”

Purity Foods Inc., based at 2871 Jolly Road in Okemos, is a worldwide supplier of certified organic foods and also produces and distributes the Vita-Spelt retail line of organic food.

According to The Organic Report, 48 percent of consumers use organic products at least occasionally, and .2 percent of cropland in the United States is certified organic. This is compared with nearly 10 percent in several European countries.

Organic consumers run the gamut from mothers with small children to older people concerned about their health to socially conscious college students.

Among the third group is chemical and electrical engineering senior Dave Bordoley, who has been a strict vegetarian for three years.

“I’m not really trying to change the world,” he said. “I’d like to think that if enough people did it, it would, but that’s not likely to happen.”

Bordoley said he doesn’t eat meat for moral reasons because he doesn’t believe in eating animals.

But he’s a vegetarian for health reasons, too.

“Modified foods and pesticides could have a really negative impact on someone’s diet,” Bordoley said. “I’d rather eat organic food.”

Evidently, though, it’s not too difficult for him to find food that suits his tastes.

“I’ll experiment a lot,” he said. “I’ll eat a lot of Thai food or I’ll eat a lot of Indian food. It kind of opens up your diet to a lot more options.”

And because he doesn’t eat meat products, grocery shopping is a little more difficult, though Bordoley said he can find many vegetarian products at the local Meijer.

But when a product he wants can’t be found at Meijer, Bordoley heads for Foods for Living or the East Lansing Food Co-Operative, 4960 Northwind Drive.

At the food co-op, about 3,500 members - including Bordoley - own a share in the store, which sells many organic foods, and profits go directly back into it. However, you don’t have to be a member to shop at the store.

Janet Weinstein and Diane Lawhern explained the co-op concept as they rearranged storefront displays Tuesday.

“The people who work here, we actually eat the food that we sell,” Lawhern said.

She said having a knowledge of the food they sell helps when college students come in, looking to experiment and alter the diet they grew up with.

“A lot of people aren’t raised in households where people cooked things like rice, especially brown rice,” she said.

But once they begin making their own meals away from parents and the dorm, Lawhern said many students start to question what they’re eating and begin to make changes in their diet.

“For the most part, it’s not about ethics as much as food preference,” she said. “Some people don’t enjoy eating meat, some people can’t.”