The burgeoning meat-alternatives market in the U.S. is about to get another competitor for case space at retail.
Vancouver's The Very Good Food Co. announced a distribution deal with Boulder, Colo.-based Green Spoon Sales to expand the company's presence into U.S. grocery stores. Currently, the company's Very Good Butchers brand meat alternatives are available online only to U.S. consumers (with products sold a la carte or in "butcher boxes"); Canadian consumers can find Very Good products in more than 150 specialty retail and restaurant locations, primarily in British Columbia.
The partnership with Green Spoon "is poised to significantly boost Very Good's wholesale retail distribution in the U.S., which is a key component of our 2021 growth strategy," The Very Good Food Co. CEO Mitchell Scott said in a news release.
Very Good offers products ranging from jackfruit steaks to adzuki bean pepperoni sticks to bean-and-barley burgers. The company also operates a vegan "butcher shop" in Victoria, B.C.
Scott and fellow co-founder James Davison created Very Good after becoming "fed up with the overly processed meat alternatives available" elsewhere in retail, the company's website states. The two launched their business at farmers markets on Denman Island, B.C. In February, Very Good named Ana Silva, formerly CFO at dairy-alternatives powerhouse Daiya Foods, as president.
"We are excited to partner with a like-minded company like Green Spoon to help us reach even more consumers at the store-shelf level in regional and nationwide grocers and other brick-and-mortar retailers," Scott said in the news release, stating that the company is in "advanced conversations" with several large and midsize chains to carry Very Good products in hundreds of U.S. locations.