Close Ad

The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

WeWork Food Labs

Ex-WeWorkers Have Launched Santa, A Hybrid ‘Retail Experience’ Startup Focused on ‘Small US Cities’

What in the world are these ex-WeWorkers up to?

That was my first thought when I saw a number of former WeWork employees, including the former chief product office/head of WeWork Labs Roee Adler and the former head of WeWork Food Labs Menachim Katz (disclosure: The Spoon was once a member of WeWork Food Labs) were busy working on a mysteriously stealthy startup by the name of Santa. The company also lists the co-founder of Fiverr, Shai Wininger, as a boardmember (I’m assuming he’s an early stage investor).

The company’s main online presence is a placeholder website that gives away nothing. More information is available on Linkedin, including a recent update by Adler, who lists his current job as the CEO of Santa.

From his update:

“…want to join Santa? We have some super complex tech problems to solve as part of a novel b2c experience we’re building, combining physical and digital, ML and human emotions, and lots of fun.”

So not a ton of info, and really a sentence that could basically come from maybe 25% of the pitch decks circulating in Silicon Valley (or Silicon Wadi) at this point.

A little more info came from this description of Santa in one of the job listings they have on Linkedin: “Santa is a new Israeli startup building a novel physical/digital retail experience for small cities in the US.”

Now we’re kind of getting somewhere. From the sounds of it – and judging by the some of the job skills Santa is seeking in the listings on Linkedin – Santa looks like a consumer-facing hybrid physical/online consumer retail startup that will have some experiential aspects to it.

The small US-city angle is interesting and perhaps the most mysterious part to me – why small US cities and not big towns? This makes me wonder what the physical retail footprint part will be. Will Santa actually have their own retail space? Will they co-locate in a store-within-a-store concept? Will they be some b8ta-like concept platform that other retailers can use to give them a fresh take on multichannel interaction with consumers?

And then there’s the whole machine-learning and emotional connection aspect that Adler alludes to that is also intriguing.

Of course, The Spoon is a food-focused news site, and whether any of this actually connects to food is yet to be seen. I reached out to Menachim Katz, whom I knew when he was member of WeWork Food Labs, via Linkedin and he told me “no” when I asked him if Santa would have a food angle.

Whether or not Katz is being cagey – they are in stealth after all – is to be seen. For now we’ll assume that the company is not a food company (Santa would be a weird name for one), but it does look like it will be a consumer facing retail play with some delivery aspects, so maybe food will be one of the many products they launch.

Hopefully they’re come out of stealth in the near future and this mystery of Santa will soon be solved.

Introducing Customize, the Food Personalization Summit

If you live in the U.S., odds are you have Thanksgiving on the mind this week. Though many T-Day menus feature the same classic rolodex of dishes — turkey, cranberries, stuffing, etc. — each spread is slightly personalized to reflect the preferences of the chef and guests.

But personalization goes well beyond what’s on the holiday dinner table. In fact, we here at The Spoon believe breakthrough discoveries in food science, artificial intelligence, micro-manufacturing and other critical areas will lay the foundation for a food system that will be radically reshaped by personalization over the next decade.

However, even as the era of one-sized-fits-all food comes to an end, the conversation in the space is pretty fragmented. While everyone knows that personalization is the goal, they’re not exactly sure how to make it happen.

Which is why we created Customize, a one-day executive summit that will explore the impact of personalization across the food system. Customize will take place in New York City on February 27th at WeWork’s awesome 85 Broad St. space in NYC’s Financial District. (WeWork Food Labs is our awesome event partner for Customize.) 

Throughout the day we will examine topics from the food personalization space, including microbiome-based nutrition, AI-powered grocery recommendations, CPG development and more. 

To help create an amazing day of conversation, we’ve already recruited a star-studded lineup of speakers, including:

And that’s just the beginning. We’re adding more speakers every week, so be sure to check back regularly for updates. If you are building something world-changing in the area of food personalization, drop us a line or fill out our information form on the Customize website and let us know!

Tickets absolutely will sell out — get your Early Bird pass now before prices go up on December 31.

Finally, if your company has something interesting cooking in the world of personalization and you would like to be a sponsor for Customize, let us know!

We’re super excited to bring you this new event and look forward to exploring the world of food personalization with you in February.

See you in New York!

SKS 2019: Why Big Food is Betting So Heavily on Startup Accelerators

So you’re a new food startup who wants to level up and get some funding and mentorship. Or you’re a big CPG company who wants to uncover the latest food trends and acquire companies already tapping into them.

The answer for both quandaries might be food accelerators or incubators. Key word: might.

At SKS 2019, we dove into the wide world of food accelerators: what are they, which types of food companies should consider them, and why they’re suddenly all the rage. Weighing in on this conversation from the stage were Natalie Shmulik, CEO of The Hatchery; Tessa Price, Program Manager of WeWork Food Labs; and Peter Bodenheimer, Partner & Managing Director of Food-X.

If you’re contemplating applying for an accelerator program or just curious what they actually entail, you should watch the whole video of the panel below. Here are a couple of standout points made by our speakers to spark your interest:

What do food accelerators look for?
All of the panelists agreed that when searching for candidates for their programs, fit is critical. Shmulik emphasized the importance of a good founder presence. Price said that companies have to align with WeWork’s values and offer some technology that can accelerate WeWork’s ecosystem. For Bodenheimer, though, one of the biggest factors is persistence. “When the sh*t gets tough, will they stick with it?” he asked.

Why are food accelerators so hot right now?
You may have noticed that food accelerators seem to be popping up left and right lately. According to Bodenheimer, this is at least partially because of Big Food companies. He explained that large food and beverage companies typically only allocate 1-2 percent of their budget to R&D, so they turn to accelerators as a way to access more innovative products. Sometimes this can be productive, but other times it can be muddy, especially if the Big Food company doesn’t have a clear objective for their program.

So, what are the newest food trends?
Of course I wasn’t going to let these industry experts off the stage without asking them about the innovative new trends they were seeing bubbling up at their respective accelerator/incubator programs. Shmulik noted that more and more companies were looking to make eating an experience, not just a task. Price spoke about personalized nutrition and on-demand ordering, and Bodenheimer said he’d seen a lot of companies tapping into food as medicine, plant-based offerings and CBD.

If you want to hear the rest of the panelist’s up-and-coming dining trends to watch, or learn more about food accelerators in general, watch the full video below.

SKS 2019: Building a Food Accelerator

Should You Join a Food Tech Accelerator for the Money?

Here’s a question for you food tech startup CEOs out there: should you join a food tech accelerator just for the money?

Definitely not, at least according to Tessa Price of WeWork Food Labs and Peter Bodenheimer of Food-X.

Of course, funding is funding and can be hugely important for any startup’s growth, but there are more important reasons to join an accelerator say Price and Bodenheimer, both of whom joined me for a live conversation this week in what was our first Foodtech Fireside chat.

One of the main reasons a startup shouldn’t make funding the one and only reason to join an accelerator is the equity ask is going to be bigger than with other forms of funding.

“There’s cheaper money out on the street than accelerator money,” said Bodenheimer. “The deal structures in accelerators for investment typically are different from what you’ll see from just an investor not running an accelerator.”

And while it may seem obvious on its face, another important reason, quite simply, is in the name.

“They have potential to accelerate the growth of a startup in a very compact period of time,” said Price. “The value in the ecosystem is that accelerators provide a fairly safe environment to come together and access resources in a way they aren’t able to when they are dealing with a more traditional VC or angel investor.”

Then there’s also community and connections to the food tech ecosystem that come from spending two to three months in an accelerator.

“Having a density of entrepreneurs working in similar types of businesses, that leads to good things,” said Bodenheimer. “Having a support community is really important, and so is being able to leverage the network an accelerator can bring.”

Finally, food tech accelerators give startup CEOs a unique once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to step outside of the business and look at what they are doing through fresh eyes.

“There’s a saying: sometimes you’re too busy working in your business to work on your business,” said Bodenheimer. “An accelerator gives you an opportunity to work on your business with focused effort.”

We’ve turned the fireside into a podcast you can listen the full conversation with Tessa Price and Peter Bodenheimer on Apple Podcasts or by clicking play below, or you can also listen to and download the episode directly with this link.