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Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

Beyond Meat

Beyond Meat Launches New Plant-Based Meatballs

Beyond Meat announced today that it has launched Beyond Meatballs, a new line of pre-formed and pre-seasoned plant-based meatballs that will be available at select grocers nationwide starting this week.

According to the press announcemt, Beyond’s new meatballs, which are derived from peas and brown rice have:

  • 19g of plant-based protein
  • 30 percent less saturated fat and sodium than leading brands of animal-based meatballs
  • No cholesterol, antibiotics or hormones

Beyond said this is the company’s third new retail product launch for this year, but really it’s more like two and a half. The company launched its plant-based sausage at retail in March, then launched its Cookout Classic in June, but the latter was really a bulk re-packaging of its existing burgers.

The addition of meatballs is more of a convenience play. Sure, you could make your own plant-based meatballs by forming them out of the ground Beyond Meat. But that takes more work. Having meatballs ready to go for a sandwich or spaghetti is a smart way to diversify your flexitarian menu-planning options.

Beyond’s announcement today also continues the rapid back and forth announcements that have gone on all summer long between Beyond and its main rival, Impossible Foods. As I wrote earlier, most of the announcements from the two plant-based giants have been about scale and not entirely new lines of products (i.e., new kinds of plant-based meat) and these Beyond Meatballs continue that trend.

The Beyond Meatballs will hit retailers such as Whole Foods, Stop & Shop, Kroger and Albertsons across the U.S. this week and continue rolling out through October. They will have a suggested retail price of $6.99 for 12 meatballs.

UPDATE: An earlier version of this post said that the meatballs would be available in early October.

Beyond Meat Will Build Production Facilities in China

Beyond Meat announced today that it will build two production facilities in China’s eastern province of Zhejiang, near Shanghai. According to a recent announcement from Beyond, this is the first time a fully plant-based, foreign company has expanded its facilities to China.

Beyond Meat already has roots in China; this year it launched its plant-based beef product in over 3,300 Starbucks throughout the country. Additionally, the company debuted a limited-time trial run of its plant-based burgers in several KFC, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut franchises throughout China at the beginning of summer.

China’s meat supply chain was greatly disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused mass shortages and price inflation. China is an animal protein-hungry country with a growing population, and disruptions in the meat supply chain open up an opportunity for Beyond Meat to offer its plant-based alternatives to the country. Beyond Meat will face competition from already established plant-based meat companies in China, Omnipork and Starfield among them.

China and the U.S. are not the only markets that Beyond Meat has penetrated. Earlier this summer, the company acquired a new production site and opened a co-manufacturing facility in the Netherlands. Additionally, Beyond Meat is available in major Canadian grocery stores and has also recently launched a direct-to-consumer e-commerce site (that only serves the U.S., however).

Demand for plant-based meat alternatives us certainly not limited to one area of the world. The global plant-based meat market is expected to grow to be worth 4.2 billion by 2021, and Beyond isn’t the only major player in plant-based proteins expanding internationally. Eat JUST has several global partnerships at work, and Impossible Foods just announced today it is expanding into Canada.

The future Beyond Meat facilities in China will produce plant-based beef, pork, and chicken alternatives under the Beyond Meat brand. The facilities are expected to reach full-scale production by early 2021.

The Beyond Meat Sausage Patty is Exactly What I Wanted

OK, look. I know this review of Beyond Meat’s Sausage patty isn’t exactly hot. The product debuted in at retail back in March (which is approximately 17 years ago in pandemic time). But! In my defense, it wasn’t available at my local grocer until recently.

Ironically, now that it is available at my local grocer, I skipped the store altogether and ordered it directly from Beyond Meat, which launched its own e-commerce site last week.

I took a bit of a chance ordering a product I hadn’t yet tried direct because you can only order in bulk from Beyond. So a few clicks and shipping days later, 44 frozen plant-based breakfast patties arrived at my door (complete with a Beyond-branded facemask) earlier this week.

A couple years back, when touring the Beyond HQ and R&D facility, I had actually tasted an early version of the sausage patty. I raved about it at the time and hoped that the final production version would live up to that fond memory.

It most certainly does.

The Beyond patties are smaller than what you’d find in a restaurant or QSR breakfast sandwich but in line with other frozen sausage patties available at the grocery store.

Beyond recommends cooking them on the stove or oven — not the microwave. I cooked mine in the June Oven, which doesn’t have an automated cook program for the Beyond patties yet (it has presets for the Beyond Burgers and Brats). While the patties came out nice and piping hot, next time I’ll use the stove or griddle to get a little more of a crust on the outside.

I threw some cheddar on the cooked patty and slid the whole thing onto an english muffin. Because the patty is on the small side, the muffin sort of engulfs and overwhelms the sausage. But that’s just a nit-pick. The important thing is the taste, and Beyond nails it.

The Beyond sausage patty has a rich, peppery, greasy (in the best way) taste, with the right texture and mouthfeel. I don’t think it would fool a meat eater, but I’m not sure it needs to. In addition to the straight patty, I can easily see grinding these up and using them to spice up other plant-based meat dishes.

While I may have been late to Beyond Sausage, I’m glad it’s finally in my freezer. The pandemic has highlighted and reinforced the ethical and labor issues around animal-based meat production, which makes me feel more at ease eating plant-based meats. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that they are also delicious.

Beyond Meat Now Sells Directly to Consumers

Beyond Meat announced today that it has launched a new e-commerce site that allows consumers to buy the company’s plant-based beef and sausage products directly from the company.

The store is open to people in the contiguous U.S., and features two-day shipping for all orders. From the press announcement, items sold on the site include:

  • Burgers & Beef Combo Pack – A carton of 10 Beyond Burger patties and two 1lb. packages of Beyond Beef ($54.99)
  • Brats & Beef Combo Pack – A carton of 10 Beyond Sausage Original Brat links and two 1lb. packages of Beyond Beef ($59.99)
  • Beef Bulk Pack – Six 1lb. packages of Beyond Beef ($71.99)
  • Breakfast Sausage Variety Pack – One 22-count carton of Classic Beyond Breakfast Sausage and one 22-count carton of Spicy Beyond Breakfast Sausage ($54.99)
  • Go Beyond Trial Pack – One package of Beyond Burgers (two 4oz patties), one package of Beyond Beef (1lb.), one package of Beyond Sausage Original Brat (four links) and one package of Classic Beyond Breakfast Sausage (six patties) ($49.99) 

Beyond mentioned the new D2C channel in June, when it launched bulk packaging of its burgers, so today’s news is not surprising. Nor is it surprising in the broader, competitive context of the plant-based meat sector. Earlier this summer, Beyond’s big rival, Impossible Foods launched its own D2C channel through which it sells its own plant-based burgers in bulk.

The timing is right for both of these companies to go directly to consumers. Sales of plant-based meat have taken off during the COVID-19 pandemic, which has highlighted inequities and inefficiencies in our traditional meat supply chain. The pandemic has also pushed people into record levels of grocery e-commerce, so buying something like plant-based meat online no longer seems like a foreign concept for many.

In addition to this D2C rivalry, it has been an incredible active summer in for both Beyond and Impossible overall. Beyond Meat has done multiple deals with restaurant chains in China, and launched a second plant-based chicken pilot with KFC in California. For its part, Impossible has raised $200 million, vastly expanded its U.S. retail presence and launched its plant-based sausage in earnest to restaurants around the country.

While summer was certainly a hot time for plant-based meats, don’t expect things to cool off in the sector any time soon. Both companies are expanding their product lines and will continue to expand their retail footprints.

Impossible, Brave Robot, Magic Spoon. Are We Near a Tipping Point for New Foods?

To borrow from Phil Collins, there is definitely something in the air when it comes to the food in our kitchens. While I don’t think we are fully there yet, it feels like we are the cusp of major changes to what we eat at home.

I got to thinking about this last week when I noticed my day started eating a bowl of Magic Spoon‘s “healthy” sugary cereal and ended with a few bites of Brave Robot’s non-animal flora-based ice cream.

Neither of these products existed little more than a year ago. Both sell direct to consumer. And both are new formulations of old standbys angling to replace existing products we currently stock in our cupboards.

Oh, and both are delicious.

They are also expensive. It’s $40 for four boxes of Magic Spoon and $58 for four pints of Brave Robot. That’s WAY too expensive to be mainstream right now. So even though my kitchen carries these items, I recognize that I am a very off to the side as an edge case.

It would be cliché to say that we’re in the first inning of this food tech game and that prices will come down as those companies scale up. Of course they will. The point of this post is that we aren’t in first inning any more.

In addition to new cereals and ice cream, my freezer is full of Impossible and Beyond plant-based meat, I drink oatmilk, I enjoy JUST egg products, I’ve become addicted to Pig Out plant-based pork rinds, and I’m anxiously awaiting the day Loca will sell its plant-based cheese online.

All of these products feel mature. They aren’t almost there, they’re here, and they have arrived at just the right time and they are at scale. Sales of plant-based foods were already growing before the pandemic, which added some rocket fuel to the mix. And now, these new foods don’t have to rely on traditional retail infrastructure to reach consumers. Brands can market on social media and sell directly through their own websites. Like Magic Spoon and Brave Robot, Impossible has its own sales channel, as does Pig Out and Beyond will soon be following suit.

This is good because consumers are getting used to buying their food online. The pandemic pushed people into record amounts of grocery e-commerce. And now that we’ve been doing it for months and formed new habits, the idea of buying food — especially non-produce items — online is almost second nature.

There is still a ways to go, I’d call this the end of the first quarter, and dominance perpetuates itself, so existing big CPG players will remain big (think: Oreos and Doritos and such). But looking at where we are now, the next generation of food products becoming our new normal is no longer against all odds (the superior Phil Collins song).

Wawa Goes Beyond Standard Convenience Store Fare With a Plant-Based Breakfast

Like most other types of food businesses, the convenience store is changing due to the pandemic, and that includes what’s on the menu when it comes to food. In line with that, today, convenience store chain Wawa announced a partnership with Beyond Meat to bring a plant-based breakfast option to its stores.

Dubbed the Sizzli Breakfast Sandwich, the new item will use Beyond’s Breakfast Sausage product. As of today, it’s available at 650 Wawa stores in the Mid-Atlantic region and will be available in all Florida stores from August 10 onward.

In certain parts of the country, namely the Mid-Atlantic, Wawa is practically iconic in the world of convenience store chains. But like many food businesses nowadays, it’s having to reinvent itself in the wake of changing consumer demands around healthy eating and massive shifts in how people get that food.

The chain already offers its “Wawa Your Way” menu, which offers healthier options and caters to various dietary needs/preferences (gluten-free, plant-based, etc.).

Adding a plant-based option to the menu is the obvious next step. Consumer demand for plant-based proteins has surged during the pandemic as ugly truths about the meat industry continue to come to light. The whole of the alternative protein category, including plant-based meat, is expected to grow to $17.9 billion by 2025.

But plant-based options isn’t the only change Wawa has introduced recently to meet new consumer behaviors. With more people staying at home, or just wary of mingling with strangers in public settings, the company has had to turn its attention to serving folks off-premises. Wawa struck a delivery deal with DoorDash in April, then launched curbside order and pickup in June. Just this week, the chain announced its first-ever drive-thru location, which will begin construction in August in Falls Township, PA.

Wawa’s announcements follow moves by other well-known convenience store chains to shift both their formats and products to meet the current times. 7-Eleven expanded delivery and introduced a new pickup feature in July. It too has a partnership with DoorDash. Over in Tokyo, Uber Eats is delivering food from Lawson Convenience stores. And let’s not forget cashierless checkout’s march into the convenience store realm, led by Zippin, Aramark, and others.

Wawa’s news from the week is further proof multiple intersections are happening right now between convenience stores, grocery stores, and restaurants, and between plant-based diets and traditional ones. Expect more of these lines to blur as the entire food industry continues changing at the pace of the pandemic.

KFC Bringing Beyond Meat Plant-Based Chicken to SoCal, 3D Printed Chicken to Russia

KFC announced a partnership with Beyond Meat today to bring plant-based chicken sandwiches to 50 KFC locations across Southern California. Starting on July 20, the Beyond Meat Chicken will be available for a limited time in select KFCs in Los Angeles, Orange County and San Diego.

This is the latest in a string of tests KFC has rolled out for the Beyond Chicken. The restaurant chain made it first available in Atlanta, GA last year, followed by tests in Charlotte, NC and Nashville, TN, as well as a one-day promotion in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada. In Atlanta, the Beyond Chicken sparked long lines of customers who waited at least an hour to try the plant-based nuggets.

Today’s announcement continues the relationship between Beyond Meat and KFC parent company, Yum Brands. In addition to the previous market tests, this past June Yum China announced that Beyond’s burgers would be available at select KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell stores in mainland China for a limited time as well.

The timing of KFC’s move into California is actually coming at a good time. Sales of plant-based meat, which have been growing over the past few years, have surged even higher during the pandemic, as COVID-19 highlighted limitations of our meat supply and shone a light on the working conditions of meat packers.

But plant-based chicken wasn’t the only alternative protein news to come out of KFC today. Over in Moscow, KFC Russia announced that it was “launching the development of innovative 3D bioprinting technology to create chicken meat in cooperation with the 3D Bioprinting Solutions research laboratory.” In other words, KFC is looking to develop lab-created chicken nuggets. The company says it will receive a final product for testing this fall.

Motif FoodWorks and University of Illinois Are on a Quest to Find the Perfect Texture for Plant-based Meat

Food ingredient innovator Motif FoodWorks announced today it has struck partnerships with two universities to further research the properties of plant-based foods and develop technologies to improve elements like texture. For the research, Motif will work with the University of Illinois at Chicago and the University of Illinois at Champagne-Urbana.

Today’s announcement comes on the heels of Motif forming a partnership with the the University of Guelph to research plant-based fats in order to make them more like the real thing.

Fat is a key part of what makes meat taste good. And so is texture and mouthfeel. Achieving better versions of those latter two elements in plant-based meat is the driving motivation behind Motif’s partnerships with the University of Illinois. As we’ve written many, many times before, texture is one of the keys to making plant-based meat more appealing to mainstream consumers. 

In its press release today, Motif’s lead for food science, Stefan Baier, said that in order to get textures more precisely like those of actual meat, “we need to continue to evolve the way we approach food design” rather than relying on decades-old tools and technologies that might work for meat-meat but not so much for alt-meat.

Baier will lead the two-year-long project with UIC and UICU, working with the schools’ experts on advanced rheological techniques from the fields of mechanical and chemical engineering.

This isn’t the first time Motif has partnered with higher education to solve the texture riddle. In 2019, the company said it was working with the University of Queensland in Australia on improving texture of plant-based meats.

Motif’s quest to make plant-based meats replicate the properties of animal meat comes at a time when demand for plant-based meat is steadily on the rise. Many companies in the space are expanding in response. Impossible launched its direct-to-consumer site recently, and its chief rival Beyond has plans to launch a similar e-commerce store. And other companies are tackling the texture issue, too, from Redefine Meat‘s 3D-printed steaks to Ecovative’s mycelium scaffolding to Emergy’s fermented fungi steaks.

One thing Motif will need to consider in its research is just how closely consumers actually want their plant-based staples to replicate the real thing. Catherine Lamb, the Spoon’s former expert on all things plant-based meat, often said plant-based meat was too meaty. This nine-year-old concurs. But Catherine is a longtime vegetarian and the nine-year-old is, well, nine. Which is to say, adults who’ve been eating real meat for decades may prefer a more exact replication. At the moment there isn’t too much data out there on this subject, but it’s one Motif and others will most definitely need to tackle on the quest to make the perfect plant-based meat.

Beyond Meat Arrives at Alibaba Stores in China

Beyond Meat continues its expansion in China, this time into the retail sector. The company is bringing its Beyond Burgers to Alibaba’s Heme supermarkets, first in Shanghai, then elsewhere in the country later this year, according to TechCrunch. 

Beyond debuted in China earlier this year with a Starbucks partnership, selling its plant-based meat products in cafes across the country. Availability of Beyond products expanded to the Yum China empire, where they were at Pizza Hut, KFC, and Taco Bell for a limited time.

The company’s arrival in Alibaba stores is its first foray into retail in China. Though it makes sense. China has the world’s largest population and is also the world’s largest consumer of meat. The Chinese government has been urging citizens for some time now to cut down their meat consumption, which makes China a lucrative market for plant-based meat products.

This move is also the latest salvo in what has been a busy few months of back-and-forth expansion news for both Beyond and its main plant-based rival, Impossible Foods. Impossible launched a direct-to-consumer sales channel at the beginning of June. Shortly after, Beyond released bulk packaging that narrowed the price gap between its burgers and traditional meat. Beyond also announced plans for its own D2C site, which has yet to launch. Then earlier this week, Impossible announced that its Impossible Sausage is now available to all restaurants in the U.S. 

This latest deal with Alibaba helps bolster Beyond’s foothold in China. Impossible is not yet in Chinese markets, though the company has suggested in the past it plans to eventually launch products there. As demand for plant-based meat offerings has surged since the start of the global pandemic, it’s a safe bet to expect the back-and-forth news from both companies to continue throughout the year.

Beyond Meat Announces 10-Pack, Narrows Price Point Gap With Traditional Meat, Plans D2C Site

Beyond Meat today announced its new Cookout Classic, a limited edition 10-pack of its plant-based burgers going on sale this month at the majority Walmart and Target stores in the U.S.

Normally, we wouldn’t cover packaging news, but today’s announcement is less about the box Beyond’s burgers will come in and more about the price of that 10-pack. In a press announcement emailed to The Spoon, Beyond says it will sell the Cookout Classic for $15.99, which is $1.60 per patty. That brings the price of its burger closer to the cost of traditional meat.

Right now, Beyond Meat burger patties sell in two packs that retail for $4.84, or $2.42 per patty, over at Walmart.com. Regular beef hamburger patties on Walmart sell for as little as $7.92 for a 12-pack (.66 cents per patty). While Beyond’s burgers still come in at more than twice the cost of the cheapest meat option, Beyond is more likely going after a customer that is willing to spend more to begin with.

However, getting the price down will be critical for Beyond and other players in the alternative protein space in order to make plant-based burgers cross over into the mainstream. The COVID-19 pandemic actually helped push more people into buying plant-based meats, with sales of the product up 264 percent between March and May of this year. Between that and shortages with our current meat supply chain, the time is right for Beyond to get its price down to attract more customers.

Also tucked away in today’s announcement is the news that Beyond will be launching its own direct-to-consumer site later this summer. This is of particular interest because earlier this month, plant-based burger rival Impossible launched its own direct-to-consumer sales. The Impossible site sells its burgers and ground product in bulk, and with Beyond launching its new 10-pack, it’s a safe bet they will as well.

But until then, if you are looking to grill up Beyond burgers for the whole family this summer, the new Cookout Classic 10-pack will be available in Target and Walmart stores starting June 22. (But before you do, check out our guide to grilling Beyond burgers.)

Beyond Meat Deal Expands its China Footprint with KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell

Yum China Holdings announced a deal yesterday to bring Beyond Meat’s plant-based burgers to select KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell stores in mainland China for a limited time this month. The move expands Beyond’s presence in China, which has been a priority for the company.

As part of the deal, KFC and Pizza Hut will both offer the Beyond Burger, while the Taco Bell locations will offer a taco made with Beyond meat. All three restaurants are offering the plant-based alternatives for just a limited time.

The Yum deal follows a similar partnership Beyond announced in April, when Starbucks in China added three dishes made with Beyond’s meat product. Beyond has a particular focus on Asia and has a goal of producing its plant-based burgers in the region before the end of this year.

All of these QSR deals help Beyond establish a foothold in China before its rival, Impossible Foods has a chance to do the same. China is something of a holy grail for plant-based meat companies. As we explained last year:

  • China has the largest population in the world
  • China produces the most meat in the world
  • China consumes the most meat in the world, and its hunger for protein is growing

Additionally, pork is the most consumed meat in Asia, and earlier this year Impossible debuted its plant-based pork product at CES.

We can expect to see Beyond make more deals like the Yum one in the coming months. And for it’s part, Impossible has been ramping up production and its retail presence here in the U.S. over the past year, and seems to be prepping a direct to consumer sales channel.

Plant-based meal sales were already skyrocketing, and that trend isn’t likely to ease up as the COVID-19 pandemic has raised new questions about the health and safety of eating animal-based meat. The business of faux burgers is very much real.

Beyond Meat Debuts in China With Starbucks Partnership

Starbucks will add Beyond Meat products to its menus in China this week, marking the alt-meat company’s first foray into that country, according to AgFunder News. The partnership comes on the heels of a similar one Starbucks and Beyond debuted in Canada earlier this year.

For the China partnership, the coffee chain will add three dishes containing Beyond products: a lasagna, a Vietnamese-style noodle salad, and pesto pasta. Starbucks will simultaneously also add two new dishes to the menu using Hong Kong’s plant-based Omnipork product.

The push into China is part of Beyond’s overall growth plans that the company outlined at the end of February, including expanding manufacturing to Asia. At the time, Beyond CEO Ethan Brown said his company will “continue to focus on Asia with the goal of producing in the region before the end of 2020.”

The COVID-19 pandemic doesn’t appear to have stalled those plans. In fact, Brown flatly stated back in February that the spread of the novel coronavirus would not prevent Beyond from entering China in 2020. “It adjusts some of our plans, but I am not taking my foot off the gas,” he said.

China is the ultimate market to tackle as far as most alternative meat companies are concerned. It has the world’s largest population and is one of the world’s largest meat producers. And Beyond isn’t alone in its plans for expansion in that country. Chief competitor Impossible Foods also plans to expand into that market.

Starbucks, meanwhile, set a preliminary goal at the beginning of the year to become resource positive by 2030 when it comes to carbon, water, and waste. Offering more alternative meat products is part of that, as traditional livestock farming is an extremely resource-intensive endeavor.

Starbucks has over 4,300 stores in China. Most of those closed when the country went on lockdown to stem the spread of the novel coronavirus. The Seattle-based chain has reopened 95 percent of its locations.