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Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

bloomberg.com

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Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#351

Post by PurpleRamen »

auggierose wrote: post #238
yreg wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems that they don't plan to "turn 100% plant based", but rather built a new factory that is 100% plant based. The ≤5% estimate is just as inaccurate though. > “Over the full year [2021], we sold for the first time more of our vegan and vegetarian products than of the classic meat products. Last year, the ratio had been fifty-fifty,” the spokesperson added, without giving detailed figures. https://www.just-food.c…

> The ≤5% estimate is just as inaccurate though. Well, render me extremely surprised! I am wondering if that is because the population as a whole goes vegan/vegetarian (which I doubt), or if they are one of the few producers offering a wide range for vegetarians, and so they get all the vegetarians as customers.

> I am wondering if that is because the population as a whole goes vegan/vegetarian (which I doubt),

At the moment, the number seems to be more around 10%.

> or if they are one of the few producers offering a wide range for vegetarians, and so they get all the vegetarians as customers.

Yes, mainly this. They have a big focus on vegi-products, were building the market in the past, but were also cannibalizing other producers and products. But still, the market grows, people are more often buying replacements, going half-vegetarian and such. But we have to see whether this sticks. The market is still very dynamic, with new products coming every some months and old products changing from time to time. At the moment there is big hype with many companies going into the market, but not all of them are that good.

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#352

Post by stavros »

whazor wrote: post #282
myspy wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aldi has a great chicken replacement and the meatballs packaged with a pack of ketchup are excellent. I would wish for them to be available in a larger version without the ketchup. Another problem I have with all of this is the plastic packaging for everything. Getting something like that at a veggie butcher would be cool.

In a podcast I heard that The Vegetarian Butcher initially had experimental biological degradable packaging, but after buying hundreds of thousands they all went bad, and had to be thrown out. Now they use plastic packaging and they only try to solve one problem at a time.

This sounds weird to me, it was a surprise to them that biodegradable packaging biodegraded?

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#353

Post by Nursie »

taylorius wrote: post #230
lampe3 wrote: post #161

Can we add an "in the US" at the end? Since for EU countries this is not true. I'm living in sweden now and lived in germany and poland. Plant-based meat products are growing in numbers and the price of meat is going so high that its cheaper to buy the plant-based one. In Germany one producer of meat sausages want to turn 100% plant based[1]. I will not go into the whats better and not for you. Since this highly depe…

It's a bit of a flop in the UK too tbh. It's been pushed fairly hard, but not that much uptake.

https://www.statista.com/outlook/cmo/food/meat/meat-substitu...

The size of the meat-substitute market in the UK appears to have grown steadily to about 1.5 billion quid.

With the UK beef products market hitting around 4.4 billion quid, I'd say that's pretty sizeable.

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#354

Post by chimprich »

sirsinsalot wrote: post #307
chimprich wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why on earth would anyone listen to a vegetarian about what makes a good meat alternative. Because most vegetarians have likely tried a lot more meat substitutes than a meat eater, and most of them have eaten meat at some point? It seems that any story about meat-eating brings out all the reactionary commenters and switches off critical thinking skills on HN.

I wouldn't take driving advice off someone that hasn't driven for 10 years, even if they passed their test. I wouldn't take health advice on faith from someone who has a medical degree but never practices medicine. It's about relative interest. My point wasn't that vegetarians can't know, but that their advice isn't as valuable to me as a recommendation from a current meat eater. The meat eater has less agenda and mo…

> I wouldn't take driving advice off someone that hasn't driven for 10 years, even if they passed their test.

That's a faulty analogy. The equivalent would be getting advice on alternatives to driving from someone who no longer drives.

I don't think I'd request advice on the best form of public transport from someone who drives everywhere and has taken the train once or twice.

> The meat eater has less agenda

Ha! Really? Everyone has an agenda. Meat eaters / car drivers / vegetarians / non-drivers have all emotionally committed to their decision. It's naive to think otherwise. Everyone likes to assume their choice is the sensible one and the "other side" has an irrational militaristic agenda.

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#355

Post by Maken »

lampe3 wrote: post #161

Can we add an "in the US" at the end? Since for EU countries this is not true. I'm living in sweden now and lived in germany and poland. Plant-based meat products are growing in numbers and the price of meat is going so high that its cheaper to buy the plant-based one. In Germany one producer of meat sausages want to turn 100% plant based[1]. I will not go into the whats better and not for you. Since this highly depe…

I am not so sure about that. In Spain we have also seen a remarkable increase of vegan offerings, with even the smaller supermarkets having a good selection of vegan food and vegan precooked dishes. However, I have barely seen anybody ever buying those. So, I can't tell if that increment in supply is a response to an increment in demand by the consumers, or those companies are burning money fast hoping for a market to appear.

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#356

Post by InCityDreams »

lampe3 wrote: post #161

Can we add an "in the US" at the end? Since for EU countries this is not true. I'm living in sweden now and lived in germany and poland. Plant-based meat products are growing in numbers and the price of meat is going so high that its cheaper to buy the plant-based one. In Germany one producer of meat sausages want to turn 100% plant based[1]. I will not go into the whats better and not for you. Since this highly depe…

*upvotes in European * Fucking hell, i was eating vegan sausages 30 years in the uk...

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#357

Post by InCityDreams »

auggierose wrote: post #167
lampe3 wrote: post #161

Can we add an "in the US" at the end? Since for EU countries this is not true. I'm living in sweden now and lived in germany and poland. Plant-based meat products are growing in numbers and the price of meat is going so high that its cheaper to buy the plant-based one. In Germany one producer of meat sausages want to turn 100% plant based[1]. I will not go into the whats better and not for you. Since this highly depe…

This is a gross misrepresentation. Ruegenwalder is not turning 100% plant based, in terms of sold products I would be surprised if they turned > 5% plant based, but I don't know the numbers there.

>but I don't know the numbers there

When you do know [the numbers]...please let us know. Perhaps before posting?

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#358

Post by dfxm12 »

serial_dev wrote: post #337
Moldoteck wrote: post #29

Maybe unpopular opinion, but for me, best plant based patties are those that do not try to replicate meat taste. I much prefer patties made from actual plants&vegetables/mushrooms/chickpeas/beans like potato, carrot, some spices and so on. They have like actual 'natural' flavor, almost like something homemade. Those that add a ton of additives often taste awful, even beyond/moving mountains...

I was a vegetarian for years, and I totally agree. People always recommended me these awful veggie/vegan alternatives to meat, and they were all disgusting. Fake bacon, fake meat, fake sausage, fake ham, baloney, all ended up being stomach turning. Interestingly, only people who recommended me these still ate meat, never vegetarians. The thing is that there are many alternatives (falafel, all kinds of different chees…

Interestingly, only people who recommended me these still ate meat, never vegetarians.

Some people have a near religious connection with their burgers & nuggets. I'm not so naive as to believe this isn't in some way motivated by "winning" the fake meat market like McDonald's more or less "won" fast food, but by getting omnivores to remember that they aren't carnivores, and getting them to just cut down their meat intake a little bit will do wonders for the sustainability of our planet and help move away from factory farming animals. That's enough for me.

If this stuff acts as the gateway drug to actual carrots and zucchini? Even better...

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#359

Post by PurpleRamen »

Moldoteck wrote: post #29

Maybe unpopular opinion, but for me, best plant based patties are those that do not try to replicate meat taste. I much prefer patties made from actual plants&vegetables/mushrooms/chickpeas/beans like potato, carrot, some spices and so on. They have like actual 'natural' flavor, almost like something homemade. Those that add a ton of additives often taste awful, even beyond/moving mountains...

It's a matter of taste. If you're accustomed to meat, or even industrial meat-products, then they taste quite good. But if you're from a different taste-realm, it can be indeed very disgusting. This is similar to all the diet-products. People always want the taste, but not the guilt.

Re: Plant-based meat is turning out to be a flop

#360

Post by zoklet-enjoyer »

myspy wrote: post #248
rob74 wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm from Germany, and I can confirm that the number of vegan alternatives to any imaginable animal product have increased sharply both in quantity and quality over the last years, to the point that you can get good vegan alternatives at discount supermarkets now. Even in the US, I wonder if what Bloomberg is calling a "flop" is a real flop or just some companies falling short of their over-ambitious forecasts (or the…

Aldi has a great chicken replacement and the meatballs packaged with a pack of ketchup are excellent. I would wish for them to be available in a larger version without the ketchup. Another problem I have with all of this is the plastic packaging for everything. Getting something like that at a veggie butcher would be cool.

Herbivorous Butcher in Minneapolis https://www.theherbivorousbutcher.com/
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