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Why $53M Wasn't Enough to Scale Good Eggs

foodtechconnect.com

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Re: Why $53M Wasn't Enough to Scale Good Eggs

#41

Post by zenbowman »

faithfone wrote: post #39
zenbowman wrote: post #8

It's a little ironic that goodeggs is considered a food technology firm, when it has nothing to do with technology, and in fact has a rejectionist approach to technology in the first place. Monsanto and Cargill are food technology firms. Advances in food technology are what allow us to feed 9 billion people with a fixed resource (arable land). There are serious innovations in food production and distribution that hav…

I sense from your comment that Monsanto is your client or employer. Would that be correct?

If that were true, I'd be proud to work there. Food innovation is of critical importance for mankind, in the same realm as space exploration or improved information accessibility.

Certainly a lot more important selling ads, or providing an internet-based service to pick up your laundry.

But it isn't true. Maybe someday.

Re: Why $53M Wasn't Enough to Scale Good Eggs

#42

Post by faithfone »

zenbowman wrote: post #41
faithfone wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sense from your comment that Monsanto is your client or employer. Would that be correct?

If that were true, I'd be proud to work there. Food innovation is of critical importance for mankind, in the same realm as space exploration or improved information accessibility. Certainly a lot more important selling ads, or providing an internet-based service to pick up your laundry. But it isn't true. Maybe someday.

It sounds like you're unfamiliar with both what Monsanto does, and with what I do.

Re: Why $53M Wasn't Enough to Scale Good Eggs

#43

Post by pbreit »

zenbowman wrote: post #8

It's a little ironic that goodeggs is considered a food technology firm, when it has nothing to do with technology, and in fact has a rejectionist approach to technology in the first place. Monsanto and Cargill are food technology firms. Advances in food technology are what allow us to feed 9 billion people with a fixed resource (arable land). There are serious innovations in food production and distribution that hav…

"Advances in food technology are what allow us to feed 9 billion people"

Without a citation I'm disinclined to believe this. Populations have managed to feed themselves without Monsanto/Cargill-style advances for pretty much all of human history. Something like a third of food goes wasted as it is.

Re: Why $53M Wasn't Enough to Scale Good Eggs

#44

Post by danharaj »

rwhitman wrote: post #31
saosebastiao wrote: post #15

Facepalms all around. Supply chains are hard, and the idea that you can just write software to "solve" them is a level of hubris that defies description. Supply chains aren't a problem you can solve with big data. They aren't a problem that be solved with machine learning. In fact, you could combine the worlds top researchers in Computer Science, Economics, Operations Research, Mathematics, and Statistics, put them i…

Not to mention that food itself does not elicit rational behavior. If we were remotely logical about how we consume food, we'd all be voluntarily eating a nutrition paste out of a tube every morning. Eating food is an animal need, and therefore we have instinctual animal behaviors around supplying it and consuming it that just can't fit into any sort of rational mental model. There are functions around food behavior…

Are you suggesting human dietary behaviors have not changed since the inception of agriculture thousands of years ago? Because they have, and that clearly demonstrates that how and what people eat is driven by complex cultural processes. But the only source of behavior you identify is in-born and determined by genetics.

Our genetics have been influenced by agriculture, already. I don't know what it means to 'move beyond' behavior. Humans are very good at changing their behavior at time scales far, far shorter than any evolutionary time scale. Even for behaviors that one would consider particularly basic, like sex or... eating behavior.

All I see is an assertion that some behavior is 'logical', actual human behavior is 'irrational', and the reason why humans are acting so irrational is because its ingrained in their DNA. The allegedly logical argument for eating Soylent is left unexplained. I doubt there is one. I doubt modern humans could yet design a single nutrition product that outcompetes a diverse diet in all benefits. I think you just use the word logical to designate things as good, and irrational to designate things as bad.

Instead of actually considering why people eat the way they do, you're not saying anything at all except that you think it's dumb. It's a very boring point to make and it looks flimsy and downright silly when your justification is Argumentum Ad DNA.

Boring, boring, boring, and unfortunately incredibly prolific on the Internet.

Re: Why $53M Wasn't Enough to Scale Good Eggs

#45

Post by davidu »

ucaetano wrote: post #26

"Scaling Food Distribution Is Really, Really Hard" No, it isn't. It is fairly straightforward and thousands of companies have scaled across the world. Scaling a two-sided network focusing on providing a niche seasonal product to a niche audience is really, really hard. It wasn't the food distribution that wasn't scalable, it was the business model. "We were motivated by enthusiasm for our mission and eagerness to bri…

As blunt as this is, it's right.

C&S Grocer does $22 Billion per year in revenue, and is profitable, doing just food distribution.

http://www.cswg.com/ and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%26S_Wholesale_Grocers

Every one of us in the USA probably ate C&S distributed food today.

Re: Why $53M Wasn't Enough to Scale Good Eggs

#47

Post by zenbowman »

faithfone wrote: post #42
zenbowman wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If that were true, I'd be proud to work there. Food innovation is of critical importance for mankind, in the same realm as space exploration or improved information accessibility. Certainly a lot more important selling ads, or providing an internet-based service to pick up your laundry. But it isn't true. Maybe someday.

It sounds like you're unfamiliar with both what Monsanto does, and with what I do.

I know what they do, not what you do.

If you know something I don't, then I have no way of using it to form an opinion until you tell me about it.

Re: Why $53M Wasn't Enough to Scale Good Eggs

#48

Post by technotony »

dragonwriter wrote: post #25
akamaka wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think folks underestimate how much agricultural science and technology there is that doesn't fall under the very narrow categories of genetic engineering and chemical pesticides. Modern society is built on top of the massive productivity improvements in agriculture that occurred before those were introduced, and there is plenty of room to innovate without using those methods. GMO crops are limited[1] in Europe, yet…

> GMO crops are banned in Europe No, they aren't. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulation_of_genetically_modi...

They are 'effectively' banned in Europe though. As you can see from this infographic[1] approval of a GMO requires a political vote in the European Commission. This takes place after a very expensive risk assessment, and you can't get that money back. It's a tough business case to spend a ton of money on the risk assessment and then be at the whim of politicians who are publicly against the technology and know they win votes by being against it. My company makes GMO plants and until the situation changes there's no way we'd considered trying to get approval.

I conjecture they setup this system because an outright ban, which would be unscientific, would violate international trade treaties, instead they just use this process.

[1] http://ec.europa.eu/food/plant/docs/decision_making_process....

Re: Why $53M Wasn't Enough to Scale Good Eggs

#49

Post by nikanj »

Animats wrote: post #4

"The single biggest mistake we made was growing too quickly, to multiple cities, before fully figuring out the challenges of building an entirely new food supply chain." This is a repeat of Webvan. Webvan had a good idea, but tried to "scale" fast. They had about 3% market share in 30 cities, and needed 30% market share in 3 cities.

The downside of venture capital, entrepreneurs need to remember that investors prefer trying for billions and failing, and consider trying for millions and succeeding a failure.

I've read a few bitter stories about people with ramen-profitable businesses who got a late-stage investment into their bootstrapped company. Basically you spend years slowly kindling a small fire, and the VC comes over a dumps a truckload of lumber on it. Might get the bonfire they're looking for, but they don't really care if they just smother your campfire instead.

Re: Why $53M Wasn't Enough to Scale Good Eggs

#50

Post by pbreit »

I wonder if the problem has to do with providing a desirable product? It's already pretty easy to get good food, good organic food and good organic locally grown food from a variety of vendors. With GoodEggs it seems you're getting a clunky ordering experience, inability to select produce, an extra shipping charge, moderate/high prices, etc.
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