A customer picks up a package of meat-based Impossible Burger during the Impossible Foods Inc. grocery store product launch at Gelson’s Markets in Los Angeles, California, USA, on September 20, 2019.
Patrick T. Fallon | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Impossible Foods lowers the proposed prices for US grocery stores by 20% and pushes it closer to achieving price equality with the meat it is trying to replace.
The recommended retail prices for Impossible’s meatless burgers are now $ 5.49 for patties and $ 6.99 for a 12 ounce package. The price cuts make meat alternatives cheaper than ever, but consumers will still pay more than double for the Impossible Burger, based on the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s national beef report for the week ending February 4.
Outside the United States, double-digit price reductions for Impossible products are also being rolled out in grocery stores.
This is the first time that the private company has reduced its retail prices, but the third time in the past year that the products have been permanently discounted. Restaurant distributors reduced prices in 2020 and again in January.
In the past year, the number of supermarkets with meat substitutes from Impossible Foods has increased by 113 times. It’s also in a 47-spot test at Costco Wholesale, which could lead to even more stores carrying its products.
The coronavirus pandemic has sparked new interest in meat substitutes as more consumers turned their food supply to grocery stores and the outbreaks of Covid-19 in meat packaging plants resulted in meat products being available.
“Our plan was not to move so fast in retail last year before Covid had a success,” President Dennis Woodside said in an interview.
Impossible’s production capacity has increased sixfold since 2019, helping to meet all the new demand. Woodside said the company’s manufacturing has become more efficient as it operates its production lines more frequently and adds more shifts to its schedule. He also said that as Impossible Foods grows, so do its suppliers.
“They can pass on savings to us,” he said.
Rival Beyond Meat is also working to lower its prices as more competition enters the market. Last summer, he sold frozen value packets of his meatless burger pies. Shares of Beyond have risen 61% in the past year, giving the company a market value of $ 11.1 billion.
In addition to competition from other companies selling realistic meat alternatives, Impossible and Beyond may soon also experience price pressure from cell-based meat manufacturers. Future Meat Technologies, an Israeli company, said on Monday that the production cost of a farmed chicken breast had been reduced to $ 7.50. Singapore is so far the only country to approve the sale of meat in laboratories, after permission was granted to Eat Just in December.
“Ultimately what we are all competing against is the 1 trillion pound industry, which is the current animal-based protein industry,” Woodside said.