We gathered recently with food industry colleagues at Future Food-Tech San Francisco, which focused this year on strengthening sustainable and nutritious food systems.
I had the pleasure of moderating a panel on foodservice innovation, and was inspired by varied conversations that demonstrated an increased recognition of the food industry’s impact on - and responsibility toward - the health of people and planet.
Here are a few of our key takeaways:
1) Sustainability alone doesn’t sell
We heard a provocative question: “If consumers won’t change what they eat to save their lives, why do we think they’ll change what they eat to save the planet?” While consumers increasingly cite concerns about the sustainability of their food, only 10% make sustainability a top priority when making food purchase decisions - and an even smaller percentage are willing to pay a premium for it.
Consumers are more focused on taste, price, convenience, and health. Food brands with the best of intentions around sustainability ignore these true purchase drivers at their peril - a lesson perhaps best embodied by the recent struggles of plant-based protein companies. As one leader said, “We’ve solved for sustainability. Now we need to keep improving on taste, cost and nutrition.”
The food industry must move quickly to change our impact on climate and natural ecosystems - our viability depends on it - but the sooner we recognize that sustainability alone won’t sell, the sooner we can deliver products that satisfy consumers AND create the positive planetary impact we need.
2) Offer consumers “what they want” and “what they need”
Health and nutrition were central to this year’s conference. We heard lively debates about giving consumers what they want - tasty, affordable, convenient food - and what they need - nutritious food that nourishes the human body.
Some leaders advocated for providing transparency that allows consumers to “make the right decisions for themselves at the right time”. Others raised the idea of “stealth health”, or making products more nutritious without actively alerting customers to the fact. Or, perhaps what we need to solve for is that “unhealthy foods have all the fun”. We need healthy foods that “flip the script”, taste great, and are backed by marketing campaigns that get consumers excited about the experience.
We do believe that brands should take responsibility for providing and shaping consumer preferences toward nourishing foods. After all, simply “letting the consumer decide” has led us to the current state where roughly half of Americans suffer from diet-related disease.
There are tradeoffs to navigate between nutrition and taste, affordability, and convenience, but with imagination and novel advances in technology and data, we can change the paradigm. And brands that provide healthier foods, without sacrificing on the experience, are those that will ultimately win the palates and pocketbooks of consumers.
3) Novel foods are focused on nutrition
We met a broad range of startups leveraging research and technology to launch new products and ingredients focused on nutrition. A few recurring themes:
“Fiber is the new protein”: As one leader put it, “We are not protein deficient in most parts of the globe. We are fiber deficient.” Only 5% of Americans are consuming adequate dietary fiber, and with the growing recognition of fiber’s role in regulating gut health, brands are launching high-fiber products in categories from bread to soda. The soda brand Olipop, low in sugar and high in plant fibers and prebiotics, offers a success story: its recent 4-week sales in a national retailer surpassed Diet Coke, Pepsi and Dr. Pepper to become the #2 brand in the category.
“The dawn of nutri-tech”: Startups are leveraging biotech to produce plant-derived ingredients like fiber, proteins, bioactives, and sweeteners that improve the nutritional profile of foods. Elo Life uses molecular farming to produce a monk fruit-based sweetener that is 300 times sweeter than sugar, without the calories. Brightseed and Ayana Bio are mapping bioactives to elevate functional foods: Brightseed recently commercialized a bioactive fiber produced from upcycled hemp, while Ayana Bio is working to produce saffron and other gut-beneficial botanicals via plant cell cultivation. The question was posed, “what if we could produce a cracker with the nutritional profile of broccoli”? Such a future may not be far off.
“Reconsider the role of processing”: Multiple speakers challenged the bad reputation of ultra-processed foods (UPFs), arguing that we should consider the outcome rather than the process itself. Many UPFs on the market today have been stripped of nutrients and contain additives designed to extend shelf life and palatability, often resulting in excessive levels of salt, sugar, and saturated fats. But if processed foods are designed to add nutrients in, make them more bioavailable, and sell at an accessible price point, they may play a role in a healthful food system.
4) Investors reset expectations
While “the gravy train is over”, investors see opportunity in disciplined startups with solid financials. Some of the advice and asks we heard:
Get back to the basics: Investors were unanimous that they are taking a more choiceful approach to their portfolios, focusing on companies with good unit economics, viable business models, and healthy cash burn rates relative to their revenue. Startups should have a clear path to profitability, seeking “acceleration capital rather than survival capital”. While valuations are down, investors argued that they are more realistic, and will ultimately stimulate new capital to come in.
Take the buyer’s view: Food brands looking to exit via acquisition are more likely to succeed if they are “big enough and material enough” to make an immediate impact on the acquiring company. Profitable growth-stage companies can provide a boost to the acquirer’s bottom line, and successfully navigate category challenges. One CPG shared that startups often seek an exit too early, and recommended that they first focus on demonstrating scalability and profitability.
A call for public support: For CAPEX-heavy businesses, we heard a call for public support, for example in the form of subsidies, grants, contracts and infrastructure. Leaders pointed to the internet and electric vehicles as parallels, emphasizing that food security, sustainable ecosystems, and healthy populations are strategic concerns for governments and should be supported as such.
Interested in chatting further about our learnings? Send us a note at hello@goodfoodadvisors.co. We’d love to hear from you.
