correction
An earlier version of this editorial misstated the percentage of repeat customers for alternative meat. In 2022, 63 percent of plant-based meat retail purchases were from repeat customers. This version has been corrected.
But American retail consumers bought 8 percent less fake meat in 2022 than in 2021, according to the Good Food Institute, a nonprofit created to promote alternatives to animal products, and only 63 percent were repeat customers. The novelty has worn off, and people are no longer excited about trying highly processed foods that cost more and don’t taste as good as the meats they’re trying to imitate. Future innovators can learn from these five struggles:
Follow Editorial Board's opinions
The taste, texture and smell of fake meat are unappetizing. Taste is the top reason people who have tried meat alternatives give for not trying them again. Mintel, a market research firm, found in a survey that only 20 percent think plant-based meats are tasty, compared with 61 percent for animal-based meats. “Shamburgers” don’t smell good when cooked because of ingredients added for effect. For example, Beyond uses cryogenically frozen fat balls made from canola oil and refined coconut oil. Beet juice is supposed to give patties their bloody quality. Impossible, a competitor, includes a yeast called soy leghemoglobin. Many fast-food chains piloted fake meats but opted not to permanently place them on U.S. menus.
It’s too expensive. The Good Food Institute says fake meat costs on average, pound for pound, 67 percent more than real meat despite herculean efforts to reach parity. Fewer people have been willing to pay this premium as inflation made everything else more expensive. Stagnant sales made scaling up harder, which made it more difficult to lower prices. Ultimately, products impersonating animals are still luxury goods that aren’t economical for cost-conscious shoppers.
The ingredient lists are too long. Packaging for fake meat usually includes eyebrow-raising lists of chemicals regular people have never heard of, not to mention elevated sodium levels. The Catch-22 for producers is that reducing salt and fat will make it taste even worse, but adding in more will give consumers looking for healthy options even more pause. Industry groups counter that plant-based products are higher in fiber and lower in saturated fats than their animal-sourced counterparts and don’t have cholesterol. But public perception has shifted, and most Americans no longer see fake meat as health food. The Food Marketing Institute, a trade association, found that half of consumers in 2020 thought plant-based foods were healthy. That number fell to 38 percent in its most recent survey.
It’s hard to shame adults into eating something. Let’s stipulate that shifting toward fake meat could reduce carbon emissions, require less land for animal cultivation and decrease antibiotics in food. Studies show most people do not change their preferences regarding plant-based substitutes even when they’re given informational nudges about the environmental impacts of meat production. Neither, apparently, does hiring Kim Kardashian as “chief taste consultant,” which Beyond tried last year.
Emphasizing climate change in marketing materials entangled the industry in the culture wars. Cracker Barrel faced customer blowback last summer, for example, when it introduced Impossible sausage.
Fake meat isn’t well-suited to American culture. Interestingly, fake meat has been performing better in Europe than in the United States. While the United States has been a carnivorous nation since the Colonial era, society has gone through previous phases of dabbling with fake meat. In the 19th century, eschewing animal flesh became trendy among temperance activists. In addition to making cereal, John Harvey Kellogg also sought to replicate the look, smell and taste of meat using nuts, according to University of Georgia historian Stephen Mihm. During the Great Depression, meat substitutes became an economic necessity. In the 1970s, amid elite hysteria about a population bomb that never detonated, hippies embraced fake meats such as Prosage, Stripple, Wham and Chicken-Like Loaf. But the market stagnated and then collapsed.
Skip to end of carousel
End of carousel- The Biden administration releases a review on the Colorado River.
- The misery of Belarus’s political prisoners should not be ignored.
- Biden has a new border plan.
- The United States should keep the pressure on Nicaragua.
- America’s fight against inflation isn’t over.
- The Taliban has doubled down on the repression of women.
The Biden administration released an environmental impact statement outlining options for cutting use of the Colorado River. Water allocations could prioritize farmers in California based on centuries-old water rights, or involve proportional cuts to Arizona, California and Nevada. The review also included the costs of the status quo.
The administration will likely decide on a course of action by August. As we outlined in an editorial in February, a voluntary agreement between the states is the best option — and a dramatic reimagining of water use is needed thereafter.
Ihar Losik, one of hundreds of young people unjustly jailed in Belarus for opposing Alexander Lukashenko’s dictatorship, attempted suicide but was saved and sent to a prison medical unit, according to the human rights group Viasna. Losik, 30, a blogger who led a popular Telegram channel, was arrested in 2020 and is serving a 15-year prison term on charges of “organizing riots” and “incitement to hatred.” His wife is also a political prisoner. Read more about their struggle — and those of other political prisoners — in a recent editorial.
The Department of Homeland Security has provided details of a plan to prevent a migrant surge along the southern border. The administration would presumptively deny asylum to migrants who failed to seek it in a third country en route — unless they face “an extreme and imminent threat” of rape, kidnapping, torture or murder. Critics allege that this is akin to an illegal Trump-era policy. In fact, President Biden is acting lawfully in response to what was fast becoming an unmanageable flow at the border. Read our most recent editorial on the U.S. asylum system.
Some 222 Nicaraguan political prisoners left that Central American country for the United States in February. President Daniel Ortega released and sent them into exile in a single motion. Nevertheless, it appears that Mr. Ortega let them go under pressure from economic sanctions the United States imposed on his regime when he launched a wave of repression in 2018. The Biden administration should keep the pressure on. Read recent editorials about the situation in Nicaragua.
Inflation remains stubbornly high at 6.4 percent in January. The Federal Reserve’s job is not done in this fight. More interest rate hikes are needed. Read a recent editorial about inflation and the Fed.
Afghanistan’s rulers had promised that barring women from universities was only temporary. But private universities got a letter on Jan. 28 warning them that women are prohibited from taking university entrance examinations. Afghanistan has 140 private universities across 24 provinces, with around 200,000 students. Out of those, some 60,000 to 70,000 are women, the AP reports. Read a recent editorial on women’s rights in Afghanistan.
1/7
Companies should stop playing imitation games. Surely they will incrementally improve quality and find ways to reduce price. But vegetables prepared properly are likely going to taste better than vegetables pretending to be ground beef. Consumers will likely revert to the better-tasting genuine article when given the chance. Instead of replicating beef, offer something different and tastier.
In the meantime, those rightly concerned about meat’s climate impacts should invest in ways to make real meat production more efficient and ethical, as well as less environmentally destructive, whether by reducing cows’ methane emissions or mastering lab-grown meat. More than 100 start-ups are working on such cultivated meat products, and we’re hopeful they can pioneer the next generation of food production.