Big Food Is Testing the Wellness Waters
Photo Credit: A fast food burger is shown. Major food brands are increasingly entering the plant-based alternative meat space. Pexels / @mael-balland-873203
Skift Take
Giant companies see the benefits of investing in wellness — and have enough money to take chances. But the wellness landscape, as we all know, is littered with fads gone bust.
Ten years ago, it would have been, well, nearly impossible to predict that a company like Impossible Foods or Beyond Meat would receive such hype. All this buzz for a veggie burger?
Clearly, we’ve come a long way from those cardboard-tasting plant-based meat alternatives. So popular are the new faux meats — hailed for being both good for you as well as the environment — that even meat producer giants like Tyson, Perdue, and Smithfield have come up with their own creations.
Take Perdue: Its “almost meatless” chicken nuggets contain some chicken, blended with cauliflower and chickpeas (interesting). Meanwhile, Smithfield launched a line of soy-based meatballs and sausages.
Right now Impossible Burger and Beyond Meat have the name recognition in the faux meat (that actually tastes good) space, plus a growing number of partnerships. Beyond Meat, for one, rece
