Instacart has appointed one of its current board members and former Facebook exec, Fidji Simo, as CEO of the online grocery shopping platform, effective August 2, replacing current CEO and founder Apoorva Mehta who will be transitioning to the role of...
Nestlé USA’s online sales grew more than 160% in 2020, with e-commerce sales accounting for 40% of its US growth, but there are still a ton of opportunities to reach more shoppers online, chief strategy officer Mel Cash tells FoodNavigator-USA as the...
The School Nutrition Association (SNA) wants Congress to once again delay stricter sodium targets and roll back whole grain requirements for school meals out of fear that students will reject the changes and drop out of feeding programs, many of which...
As the foodservice industry rebounds and consumers return to restaurant dining, mobile ordering app GrubHub took a look back at the past six months of ordering trends made by the approximately 33 million users of its mobile app.
New data from Placer.ai tracking foot traffic at America’s leading food retailers shows that traffic at Whole Foods – while rebounding - remains lower than it was in 2019, while many rival grocers have staged a stronger recovery.
By Abby Meyer, Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP; and Dr. Sara Dastgheib-Vinarov, Tate & Lyle
In the food industry, a special recipe or product formulation can distinguish a company from competitors and form the basis of a brand. Companies may spend significant R&D dollars to get the recipe just right, so how can they protect this investment...
Meati Foods – which is carving out new territory in the meat-alternative space with a fungi-based platform capable of producing ‘steaks’ and other whole cuts – has raised $50m in a Series B round co-led by new investor BOND and long-time Meati investor...
Oatmilk or oat drink? Plant-based cheese or cultured nut product? A report from the House Committee on Appropriations “encourages the FDA to provide clarity around the labeling of plant-based foods that use traditional meat, dairy, and egg terminology,”...
The Federal Trade Commission has issued its final ‘Made in the USA’ rule about how companies can make this claim on their packaging and in advertising.
The meat alternatives company has given its latest innovation challenge award to a French start-up with new technology that differs from conventional extrusion.
Harmless Harvest and majority stakeholder Danone Manifesto Ventures (DMV) are exploring opportunities to take the organic coconut water into international markets, says CEO Ben Mand, who says the San Francisco-based brand also has the potential to stretch...
Brazilian plant-based meat brand Future Farm (Fazenda Futuro) is gearing up to enter the burgeoning plant-based meat category in the US after a successful debut in Brazil and several other markets including Chile, Mexico, the UK, Germany, and the Netherlands.
“Inflation has been dramatic in the locust bean gum market and we do believe the situation is now at a tipping point for customers,” says CP Kelco, a leading supplier of hydrocolloids and other texturizing ingredients.
In the near term at least, we can expect to see continued elevated demand for food at home vs pre-pandemic levels as consumers spend more time working from home, cooking and baking, says General Mills, which is currently engaged in a significant round...
The FDA is aiming to release long-awaited voluntary sodium reduction goals and draft guidance on the labeling of plant-based milk alternatives in the next 12 months.
Global food giants Nestle and Tyson Foods have joined supermarkets and food and environmental scientists to form a new non-profit organisation that will issue front-of-pack environmental scores on food products throughout Europe.
A combination of supply chain disruptions and surging demand for sugar alternatives has created a very tight market for selected specialty sweeteners - notably erythritol and crystalline allulose – with some firms reporting shortages, longer lead times,...
The price of locust bean gum – a clean-label thickener and stabilizer from carob seeds used in everything from Philadelphia cream cheese to Planet Oat oatmilk – has more than doubled over the past year, as demand continues to exceed supply, prompting...
Unilever experienced an “explosion” in the growth of non-dairy ice cream when it introduced products through mainstream brands such as Ben & Jerry's and Magnum, according to global ice cream EVP Matt Close. But getting plant-based proteins to...
Attempts to put plant-based meats “in the same category as Twinkies” because they are both “processed foods,” should be dismissed as “meat industry propaganda,” Impossible Foods CEO Dr Pat Brown told delegates at the Future Food Tech alternative proteins...
By Matthew Walker, managing director, S2G Ventures
A market with a variety of alternative meat sources provides ultimate flexibility for the consumer, and several emerging technologies have a role to play in the meat supply chain of the future.
Israeli startup Future Meat Technologies has opened what it claims is the first ‘industrial’ cell-cultured meat facility, capable of producing 500 kilos of meat a day (the equivalent of around 5,000 hamburgers), as it gears up for a US launch next year,...
Convincing children to eat their vegetables doesn’t have to be a struggle, according to the founders of Tiny Organics, who, with an infusion of $11 million in Series A funding, are helping kids break the sugar addiction with which they are born by replacing...
Organic fresh baby food pioneer Once Upon a Farm has acquired organic direct-to-consumer frozen baby and toddler brand Raised Real for an undisclosed sum.
Children’s health advocates are calling on fast-food restaurants to further restrict marketing of unhealthy food to children on television, across social media and in their establishments after finding the industry’s annual ad spend increased 9% between...
Nature’s Fynd has received a coveted 'no questions’ letter from the FDA in response to its GRAS safety determination for its ‘Fy’ fungi ingredient (Fusarium strain flavolapis*), a protein-packed naturally-occurring micro-organism with origins in...
What is on the inside is what matters to most consumers when it comes to food and beverages, according to research from the International Food Information Council released yesterday that found Americans are paying more attention to ingredient lists than...
Mars is backing a new coalition that aims to support climate action through global supply chains. Kevin Rabinovitch, VP Global Sustainability, tells us that procurement is one of the most powerful tools in the company’s arsenal in the fight against climate...
Motif FoodWorks – a Boston-based startup focused on high-impact ingredients that can be added to plant- based meat and dairy formulations in small quantities but make a significant difference to the eating experience – has raised $226m in Series B* funding,...
Lightlife Foods’ recent campaign pitting its ‘real food’ credentials vs the 'hyper-processed' wares of Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat was dismissed by some as a PR stunt. However, it started a conversation, says president Dan Curtin, who predicts...
Royal DSM has entered into a broad commercial partnership with Colorado-based cannabinoid company Mile High Labs (MHL) for next generation science-backed cannabinoid solutions.
As the G7 summit draws to its end and groundwork commences for COP 26, world leaders have been urged to look at the food system to deliver progress on COVID-19, economic security, climate change and health.
Campbell Soup Co. executives were braced for a tough third quarter as vaccinated consumers began eating at home less just as the company cycled past the peak pantry stocking phase of the pandemic from a year ago, but even they appeared surprised by how...
Natural and organic brands catering to alternative eating styles and combining better nutrition with convenience are shifting consumer perceptions of frozen to boost purchase intent and sales that could outlast the pandemic pantry stocking surge of 2020,...
At least 86 lawsuits have now been filed against firms named in the recent Congressional Subcommittee report on heavy metals in baby food, including Beech-Nut Nutrition, which has just announced plans to exit the infant rice cereal category citing difficulties...
First came chickpea pasta, now with a new foodservice partnership with Oath Pizza in the New England area and expanding retail distribution in the frozen pizza aisle, Banza is unlocking demand for chickpea-crust pizza.
With a new name and a new fund, Loft Growth Partners – formerly known as 2x Consumer Products Growth Partners for the past 20 years – is looking to invest $60m in six or seven emerging brands that solve complex problems, are led by ‘pathological optimists’...
The Superior Court of California has ordered the state of California to answer a petition brought by a nonprofit calling for it to add processed meat to the Proposition 65 list of substances known to cause cancer or reproductive harm.
The FDA is looking at how shifting shopping habits during the pandemic, including the rapid adoption of e-commerce to buy groceries and prepared food, may have “reinforced and accelerated” the need for new measures to ensure products are safe through...
Egglife Foods has taken on the lofty goal of disrupting the $4bn tortilla category with an egg-white based tortilla that CEO David Kroll says delivers everything consumers expect from a traditional flour tortilla but with a greater degree of versatility...
The thresholds for heavy metals proposed in the Baby Food Safety Act - introduced in the wake of the recent Congressional Subcommittee report alleging ‘dangerous’ levels of lead, mercury, cadmium and arsenic in baby foods – are challenging but feasible,...
The Swiss food giant has confirmed it will update its nutrition and health strategy after British newspaper the Financial Times published leaked internal documents acknowledging that nearly 70% of its main food and drinks products, making up about half...
When it comes to meat alternatives, fat remains the final frontier for formulators, says Nourish Ingredients, which is harnessing the power of microbes to produce next-generation ‘animal-free’ fats it claims can deliver a ‘meatier’ experience than plant-based...
New Culture – one of a cluster of startups in the emerging ‘animal-free’ dairy space* engineering microbes to produce dairy milk proteins, without cows – is aiming to launch animal-free Mozzarella in late 2023.
Specialty ingredients solution supplier Innophos has introduced Optibalance 200, a specialty blend ingredient created to help bacon processors achieve peak flavor, improve appearance, and produce greater yields of bacon.
While freshly vaccinated food and beverage execs may be tentatively emerging from their homes to attend face-to-face meetings and events in the coming months, the last year has proven that virtual meetings – done right – can be just as effective, and...
Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods enjoy more than twice the in-store velocity of other plant-based meat brands in the US retail market, "and so we believe this is still very much a two-horse race,” claim analysts at Bernstein, who say some of the...