As a vegan, it is my dream to see plant-based milk options everywhere I go. Most coffee shops are hip to this, but there are certainly still some areas in the foodservice sector that lag behind in the alternative milk game. A start-up called Uproot, based in New York City, has the mission of distributing its alternative milk dispensers to college campuses and beyond.
Jacob Conway and Kevin Eve, the co-founders of Uproot, saw that plant-based dairy options we not accessible on many college campuses. Conventional milk is always an option for cereal and coffee in college cafeterias, but college students often have to ask the chef or cafeteria staff for a plant-based milk option. Dispensers for tea, coffee, and juice drinks already exist in college cafeterias, so it seemed like the logical option to have a dispenser for non-dairy milk.
The Uproot dispensers are given to college campuses, and then the schools must purchase Uproot’s bags of milk. The company produces its own plant-based milk blends, including oat, chocolate pea, and soy. The milks are shelf-stable and are good for 12 months. A 2.5-gallon bag of milk is priced between $28-$30, depending on the flavor and food distributor.
Uproot first launched its bulk dispenser program in March 2020, prior to the start of the pandemic, at Brown University and Wellesley College. The pandemic promptly shut the program down. During this time, Uproot transitioned to offer college campuses packaged 8 oz single-serving containers of its plant-based milks (which are still available for purchase).
College campuses have recently come into the spotlight for becoming a place for food innovation. Chartwells Higher Education announced earlier this year its plans for launching a plant-based dining program (called 100% Plant Forward) and ghost kitchens at colleges nationwide. At the beginning of the summer, Grubhub announced its plans for bringing food delivery robots to college campuses through its partnership with Yandex. Yo-Kai shared at the beginning of this year that it had installed its automated hot ramen vending machines at several college campus locations.
In addition to college campuses, Uproot plans on expanding to K-12 cafeterias, hospitals, and coffee shops. The company will relaunch its dispenser program this fall at Brown University, Roger Williams University, Wellesley
College, Villanova University, Wesleyan University, Bennington College, Bucknell University, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, Connecticut College, Johnson and Wales University and Stonehill College.
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