By lowering its prices, Impossible Foods want to make the food system more sustainable. | Impossible Foods
Vegan meat just got cheaper. Impossible Foods has reduced its prices, making its plant-based meat comparable to the cost of conventional meat.
In a press release, the plant-based company—which makes vegan burger and sausage meat products—revealed it had slashed its prices for U.S.-based foodservice distributors by an average of about 15 percent.
This is the second time in a year that Impossible Foods has dropped its prices. The brand also reduced the wholesale cost of its products by 15 percent in March 2020.
The company says it plans to continue lowering its prices “to help solve the environmental crisis and make the food system sustainable.”
“Our stated goal since Impossible Foods’ founding has always been to drive down prices through economies of scale, reach price parity and then undercut the price of conventional ground beef from cows,” the company’s CEO and founder, Dr. Patrick O. Brown, said in the release.
“Today’s price cut is just the latest—not the last—step toward making the food system sustainable,” he continued. “Stay tuned.”
The second round of price cuts comes amid “record global demand” for the company’s flagship product, the Impossible Burger, which debuted in 2016. It subsequently launched vegan sausage and pork products.
In August 2020, the food-tech startup revealed it had secured an additional $200 million in funding to help with expanding the research and development of new products. To date, it has raised nearly $1.5 billion, following the $500 million it garnered earlier in the year.
The new round of funding also followed the company’s push to enter grocery stores and other major retailers amid the coronavirus pandemic, which had disrupted conventional meat sales.
Impossible Foods says it will extend the price cuts to its international distributors beginning next month. These include those located in Canada, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Macau.
“There is plenty of demand from consumers at the current price,” Brown said last year during a press conference. “And, of course, as the price comes down, eventually it’s going to be game over for the animal ag industry.”
On a mission to make animal products obsolete, dairy-identical vegan milk could be up next for the company.
In October 2020, during a virtual press conference, senior flavor scientist Dr. Laura Kilman demonstrated the Impossible milk prototype. She explained: “We’re really looking to create products that function and behave just like the animal-derived version.”
This post was last modified on January 13, 2021 2:33 pm