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- Beyond Meat’s Costly Partnership With McDonald’s Could Still Pay Off
Beyond Meat’s Costly Partnership With McDonald’s Could Still Pay Off
Beyond Meat’s Costly Partnership With McDonald’s Could Still Pay Off
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When Beyond Meat first launched its plant-based meat substitutes in 2012, the company was largely focused on getting them into grocery stores. These days, the El Segundo-based food tech company is inking deals with major fast food chains including KFC and Pizza Hut.
In January, the most famous American fast food restaurant of all, McDonald’s, announced it would roll out its plant-based burger—called, naturally, the McPlant—in more markets across the country. Made in partnership with Beyond Meat, the McPlant aims to deliver the Golden Arches’ trademark taste and texture profiles but in a completely vegetarian manner.
Yet Beyond Meat’s foray into fast food has come at a price. The company’s stock has tumbled more than 70% since last June, while it posted net losses exceeding $182 million in the 2021 fiscal year (including a loss of over $80 million in the fourth quarter, on revenues that declined year-on-year). Beyond Meat partially blamed the disappointing figures on its investments in the restaurant sector, which it said have required a more painstaking product development process. As Fast Company reported Wednesday, the McPlant required several years of R&D and internal testing before finally launching.
All that said, the McPlant could prove to be a successful investment for Beyond Meat; McDonald’s told Fast Company that McPlant sales hit an average of 70 burgers per outlet per day in December, compared to 110 Big Macs. If that kind of sales pace holds across a wider scaling of the product, the McPlant could establish itself as a flagship product for the world’s largest fast food chain—especially as it aims to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. — Keerthi Vedantam
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