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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by S at Beyond (talk | contribs) at 16:13, 27 July 2021 (Edit request: new section). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

"Selling alongside" meat

I see that the article says: "In May 2016, Beyond Meat released the first plant-based burger to be sold alongside beef, poultry and pork in the meat section of the grocery store."

It's true that the Beyond Meat marketing materials indicate that they would like this to happen, and certainly it would be interesting if it were, but I have bought and tested Beyond Meat products thus far from three grocery stores, and I have yet to see this happen. Does anyone know of a store that actually does it? Given that (I believe) Whole Foods is the largest distributor of the product and as far as I can tell they don't, and neither do any of the smaller grocery stores that I've seen, I think we'd need evidence that this is happening in order to preserve this line. Otherwise it sounds like the wishes of a marketing department that haven't held up anyway. --Cwebber (talk) 17:17, 30 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that it seems like a marketing message more than any real indication of some milestone of product development, and plan to remove it. —BarrelProof (talk) 03:20, 29 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Correcting reference to study

A reference to a useful study was added in this commit, but weirdly did not accurately represent the results of the study and just said "A significant net energy loss. It is not a sustainable food choice." However in reading the actual study's comparison to cattle production, the opposite result is extracted. I think this was probably not an NPOV contribution, since I think may be the same Samkin Pommers as this cattle farmer, but at any rate I think it was worth extracting what the study actually said, so I provided a quote from the abstract. However I think it's important to note that the study *was* commissioned by Beyond Meat, and even though I don't see any evidence that the university didn't provide due diligence, I noted that in the article because that seems like important information to know. If a study becomes available that isn't commissioned by a stakeholding interest, it would also be useful to reference.

I will also note that in the preceding paragraph, "one dietician" is quoted; it would be useful to have a better sampling of research than quoting the subjective opinion than one dietician, but I did not remove it myself. --Cwebber (talk) 17:08, 30 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Price

The article tells us about the general availability of “Beyond Meat” products in the US, so it should be possible – and interesting – to know whether and how much they’re cheaper or more expensive (to buy and possibly produce) than the products they aim to replace (either mass-produced or “organic” meat). — Christoph Päper 20:53, 26 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I recently used Beyond Meat in an exam for my graduate students and did a price check of the products on the Internet. While my sample size was small, the products appear to be significantly more expensive than their meat alternatives. For example, the Beyond Burger was almost $19 per pound. Hamburger is much less expensive. The company does not disclose production figures and was still losing money in 2020 and in 1Q:21. However, that includes all costs except financing the firm. Gross margin was 30.2% in 1Q:21 so the price at wholesale more than covers the production costs but does not cover marketing, overhead, or research & development. You could get an estimate on average cost-to-produce by finding out what the retail mark-up is and backing into the cost of production from figuring out wholesale price/pound (average). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.34.113.165 (talk) 17:58, 24 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]

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Recent edit

Preserving here by providing this link; my rationale was: "WP:CATALOG: excessive and promotional detail; aspirational quotes; origins story, etc." --K.e.coffman (talk) 00:12, 26 May 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Tags still necessary?

The article seems encyclopedic enough. Any specific issues we need to tackle or can I remove the maintenance tags? @K.e.coffman: AdA&D 16:37, 18 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The page still reads like an advertisement and it still contains paid contributions. --K.e.coffman (talk) 02:00, 19 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I don't see how this reads like and advertisement, please provide some examples. Maybe there were paid contributors, but let's judge the article on its merits, not who wrote it. AdA&D 15:56, 19 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
The entire section #Products is a sales brochure. --K.e.coffman (talk) 15:28, 20 April 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I'm obviously too thickheaded to understand what you're getting at... What specifically in that section seems promotional to you? It seems like a pretty straight-forward listing of Beyond Meat's products, what they're made of, and where they're sold. AdA&D 00:50, 3 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I agree - not sure what's unencyclopedic or promotional about that section. The whole article seems to be relatively balanced between the negative and positive stuff, without much bias. Jokullmusic 17:02, 15 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I don't really see why the promotional tag and the COI tag are at the top of this article. I don't see any bare promotion in the article as it stands. Maintenance tags should not remain on articles indefinitely. If someone was paid to edit it in the past, any promotional or non neutral content the taggers have issues with should be removed and the tags deleted. ♟♙ (talk) 14:55, 16 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think those tags are still necessary either, and per what appears to be the consensus of the people who have commented above, I have removed them. If someone disagrees and thinks they are still necessary, please feel free to restore them, and to comment here as to why you think they are necessary. ~ ONUnicorn(Talk|Contribs)problem solving 15:07, 16 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Promotional content Beyond Meat

Hi @174.4.26.61: Your adding extraneous not encyclopaedic content that is promotional in nature. All of that was removed last week and is now being replaced by yourself, almost sentence by sentence. You say your not being paid, so why is the content that your adding reflect almost exactly the promotional content I removed last week? Dont add it back in. scope_creepTalk 12:29, 15 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Hi @Scope creep: Hi, I did not look too close at the history. So did not notice that you were already someone working with the article. All I have added is some criticisms and ingredients included, the interest piqued after having one. I believe you are mistaken with the claim of old content being replaced almost sentence by sentence. I also have rearranged whatever sentences where there to have some sort of coherence. To avoid misinterpretations, I request you to compare the content and the references are only one or two days old so it won't be related to a week before to match exactly with the promotional content's you removed last week. However, I strongly feel the criticisms in the name should be included. 174.4.26.61 (talk) 17:43, 15 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Coolio. I'll check the content I removed against what you added. I'll do it tomorrow on here, line for line. scope_creepTalk 17:57, 15 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]
👍174.4.26.61 (talk) 18:02, 15 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Content comparison

[[Special:Contributions/174.4.26.61|174.4.26.61] added

ice protein, mung bean protein, coconut oil, and other ingredients like potato starch, apple extract, sunflower lecithin, pomegranate powder, etc. with a range of vitamins and minerals.[1]

The ingredients are mixed and fed into a food extrusion machine that cooks the mixture while forcing it through a specially designed mechanism that uses steam, pressure, and cold water to form the product's chicken-like texture.[2] However, an obesity expert at the University of Ottawa cautions the public to not allow fooling themselves into thinking these are just healthy, while the saturated fat content is be similar to beef burgers and with higher sodium levels.[3]

As of 2014, the company's product offerings consisted of Beyond Chicken and Beyond Beef.[4]

--Adding this content duplicates content already in the article. As wording is almost exactly the same as in the article already, means it is probably come a press release. Duplicated wording is used within Wikipedia as an indicator that the the information comes from that type of sources, and is not e.g coming from a newspaper or book article content.

promoted as vegan - promotional statement.

scope_creepTalk 11:00, 16 May 2019 (UTC)[reply]

References

  1. ^ https://www.barrons.com/articles/beyond-meat-impossible-foods-ipo-burgers-51557847286
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference Brown2013 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/meatsplainer-beyond-burgers-1.5125971
  4. ^ Jacob Barker (Aug 7, 2012). "Chicken substitute to be made in Columbia". Columbia Tribune. Retrieved 7 July 2014.

Vegan and fetal bovine serum

The article often uses "vegan" to describe the products, which would mean that not animal products were used during production. However, as far as I understand most cultured meat is produced using fetal bovine serum, which comes from animals. Reseachers are working on non-animal alternatives, but I was not able to determine if beyond meat has developed any. (My sources: 1234) Is there any reference that goes into more detail than simply claiming it is vegan? If not I propose to remove the word "vegan" from the article until we have a good refernce for the claim.--Snipergang (talk) 16:24, 7 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I removed the "vegan" mentions. If there a references that show/explain which beyond meat products are vegan, I am happy to reintroduce the claims.--Snipergang (talk) 18:18, 17 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Beyond Meat doesn't sell cultured meat products, and they are considered vegan by all, including the Vegan Society [1] and Tim Hortons [2]. If there were controversy surrounding the vegan designation, then that would deserve its own section within this article, but I can find no such controversy. RockingGeo (talk) 03:47, 18 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for the clarification, I actually thought Beyond meat sold cultured meat products.--Snipergang (talk) 06:50, 18 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Why is there no professional ingredient list? Why is there no mention of the controversy surrounding the product? Is the entry written by company owners ???

212.29.206.129 (talk) 08:12, 3 February 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Violations

Dear User:scope_creep I would like to ask you to assist in Beyond Meat article as the User:Atlantic306 violates the rules and puts COI template because of my minor recent edits in this article. The COI template says: "A major contributor to this article appears to have a close connection with its subject". However if to look at my edits, it's obvious that I'm not a major contributor. the article has been for years in the mainspace with dozen of wikipedians who edited it. Thanks for the help!. --KressInsel (talk) 10:28, 31 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@KressInsel: Can't remove. There is COI investigation started. scope_creepTalk 10:36, 31 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
@Scope creep: does this investigation has some deadline or is there someone who will decide when to remove COI? Just interesting. I'm not familiar with this so good as you are. Thanks! --KressInsel (talk) 11:21, 31 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
The article is a spam target, so i'm sure somebody is looking at it. scope_creepTalk 11:25, 31 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Would it be worth talking about the Nutritional Value of beyond meat products?

It seems a comparison of the bioavailability of the proteins in beyond meat (eg, pea & soy protein) vs that of animal protein is a relevant addition to this article. It appears that animal proteins can have multiple times higher protein bioavailability than that of plant derived proteins. Understanding this would allow the reader to have a better classification of the beyond meat product, as opposed to a low resolution “meat analog”. Desync-o-tron (talk) 16:06, 12 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Seems impossible to specify and source reliably for the mixed types and amounts of plant protein and nutrients used across products, which would all be formulated differently. Not likely a secret the manufacturer will reveal to competitors or the public. The Beyond Meat ingredients site remains vague - purposely, I believe. Zefr (talk) 16:22, 12 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Semi-protected edit request on 15 June 2020

Please change 270 kilocalories to 270 calories Kash ok (talk) 02:43, 15 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

 Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. --allthefoxes (Talk) 03:24, 15 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]
 Done @Allthefoxes: Actually, I've checked the source provided at the end of the sentence, and it does use calorie (in the meaning as at that article), so I have implemented the change. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 03:27, 15 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the sharp eyes!--allthefoxes (Talk) 04:54, 15 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Environmental impacts

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/02/beyond-meat-uses-climate-change-to-market-fake-meat-substitutes-scientists-are-cautious.html has some info that should probably be included e.g. comparisons with chicken and bean burgers. Mainly just saving it here for now as I'm on my phone. SmartSE (talk) 11:52, 21 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Quarterly results

@PassioEtDesiderium: Your justification for removing this does not make much sense. First up, as I already said in my edit summary when I replaced it, that this is the only quarterly result included is not a reason to remove it. If other quarterly results attract attention in reliable sources, then please add them, here's one from a few days ago. If you think it's in the wrong section, then move it somewhere else, don't remove it entirely. Why do you think it contravenes WP:NPOV? WP:Relevance is an essay, meaning that it has little standing, and in addition you have misinterpreted what it means by "twice removed" - it is referring to something similar to twice removed like a cousin, i.e. two degrees of separation, not whether the content has been removed by two different editors. WP:WEIGHT (part of NPOV) is the relevant policy which governs what material should be included and per the source "This is the first big quarterly miss for the company" which is a pretty clear indication that it is worth including. SmartSE (talk) 22:35, 1 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Edit request

Hi everyone, Soo from Beyond Meat, here. I am hoping to update the article with current and notable details as well as to improve the clarity and style of the existing text. Due to my conflict of interest, I won't make these edits myself, but am proposing them here instead. Below is a detailed proposal for improvements to the lead, and the beginning of a new breakdown for the history section complete with updates and sources. If anything seems out of place to you, please let me know and I will work to improve it as per your suggestions. Thank you so much for your help.

Lead:

  • Link to "Ethan Brown" in the lead - Ethan Brown (executive)
  • Replace "plant-based meat substitutes" (which is redundant) with simply "plant-based meat."
  • Replace: "The company has products designed to emulate beef, meatballs, ground meat, and pork sausage links and patties."
    With: "The company offers plant-based options in the beef, pork and poultry categories" (which is a more appropriate level of generality for the lead, per MOS:LEAD).
  • Add the following sentence: As of March 2021, Beyond Meat products are available in approximately 118,000 retail and foodservice outlets in over 80 countries worldwide.[1]

History section:

  • Replace the first five paragraphs of the History section, as well as the "Finances" subsection, with the following, which is expanded and organized better in new subsections:

Founding

The company was founded by Ethan Brown in 2009 to combat climate change.[2] Brown initially contacted two University of Missouri professors, Fu-hung Hsieh and Harold Huff, who had already been refining their meatless protein for years.[2][3] Upon licensing Hsieh and Huff's technology, Beyond Meat launched its first product, Beyond Chicken Strips (originally called "Chicken-Free Strips"),[4] in Whole Foods location in 2012 and expanded nationally in 2013.[2][3][5] In 2014, Beyond Meat developed its first plant-based beef product, Beyond Beef Crumbles, and has since expanded into plant-based pork.[6] The People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals named Beyond Meat as its Company of the Year for 2013.[7][8]

IPO and finance

Over the years 2013-16, the company received venture funding from GreatPoint Ventures, Kleiner Perkins, Obvious Corporation, Bill Gates, Biz Stone, the Humane Society[9][10] and Tyson Foods.[11] Tyson Foods purchased a 5% stake in Beyond Meat in October 2016[12], but sold its 6.5% stake and exited the investment in April 2019, ahead of the company's initial public offering.[13] By 2018, Beyond Meat had raised US$72 million in venture financing.[14] Beyond Meat is also backed by celebrity and athlete investors such as Leonardo DiCaprio, Jessica Chastain, Snoop Dogg, Liza Koshy, Chris Paul, Kyrie Irving, DeAndre Hopkins and others.[15][16][17]

In May 2019, Beyond Meat went public and trades on the United States NASDAQ exchange under the symbol BYND.[18] It is the first plant-based company to go public.[19] On the day of its IPO, the company was valued at $3.8 billion and was the best-performing public offering by a major U.S. company in almost two decades.[20] As of June 2021, Beyond Meat had a market cap of $9.44 billion.[21] In November 2020, Beyond Meat announced sales had only grown by 2% year-on-year compared to an expected increase of 40% due to the impact of COVID-19 on foodservice sales. Beyond Meat shifted its focus to grocery, convenience stores and other forms of distribution during the COVID-19 pandemic.[22] Sales grew by 3.5% in Q4 2020 and by 11.4% in Q1 2021. At the end of 2020, the company reported net revenues of $406.8 million the full year, an increase of 36.6% year-over-year.[23]

Manufacturing

In the United States, Beyond Meat has several manufacturing facilities in the United States, including in Columbia, Missouri and Pennsylvania.[24] In June 2018, Beyond Meat opened its second production facility in Columbia, Missouri, resulting in a three-fold increase of the company's manufacturing space.[25] In 2020, Beyond Meat acquired a manufacturing facility in DeVault, Pennsylvania.[26] In Europe, Beyond Meat has two facilities in the Netherlands: a co-manufacturing facility in Zoeterwoude owned and operated by Dutch company Zandbergen, and an owned facility in Enschede. These two facilities service the distribution network across Europe, the Middle East and Africa.[27]

In China, Beyond Meat operates an owned manufacturing plant in Jiaxing. It is the company’s first "end-to-end manufacturing facility" outside of the United States and began full-scale production in 2021.[28]

Research and innovation

In 2018, Beyond Meat opened a 26,000-square foot R&D lab in El Segundo, California housing nearly 100 employees.[29][30] In January 2021, Beyond Meat announced that it will be opening its new global headquarters in El Segundo, CA later that year. According to the company, the facility will house three to four times its current number of R&D team members once the three-phase opening of the campus is complete.[31]

  • Move the remaining three paragraphs ("In March 2019..." to "...directly to consumers") to a new subsection called "Partnerships and distribution", which I will suggest expansions for in a future edit request.

References

  1. ^ "Beyond Meat- Investor Presentation". Beyond Meat. May 6, 2021.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  2. ^ a b c Bronner, Stephen J. (January 22, 2018). "With $72 Million in Funding, the Entrepreneur Behind Beyond Meat Pursues Innovation Over Profit". Entrepreneur.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  3. ^ a b "Need to Know: Tastes like chicken, made in a lab". america.aljazeera.com.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  4. ^ Andrews, Joe (July 29, 2019). "Beyond Meat's chicken came first, and it was a failure. Wall Street and investors don't care". CNBC.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  5. ^ Manjoo, Farhad (2012-07-26). "Beyond Meat's Fake Chicken Tastes So Real That It Will Freak You Out". Slate Magazine.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  6. ^ foodnavigator-usa.com (April 3, 2014). "Beyond Meat founders: 'We're a meat company that makes products from plants'". foodnavigator-usa.com.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  7. ^ "Meet the man behind "Beyond Meat" plant-based protein substitute". www.cbsnews.com. February 13, 2014.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  8. ^ Jane Black (February 2, 2014). "43. Beyond Meat". Fast Company. Archived from the original on 3 September 2016. Retrieved 7 July 2014.
  9. ^ Darrell Etherington (May 7, 2013). "We're 80% of the way to fake meat that's indistinguishable from the real thing". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on 3 July 2014. Retrieved 7 July 2014.
  10. ^ "Where's the beef? Not in these new plant-based burgers". USA TODAY. Archived from the original on 2017-09-08. Retrieved 2017-09-07.
  11. ^ "Tyson Foods Invests in Beyond Meat". 10 October 2016. Archived from the original on 5 January 2018. Retrieved 4 January 2018.
  12. ^ Strom, Stephanie (10 October 2016). "Tyson Foods, a Meat Leader, Invests in Protein Alternatives". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 21 February 2017. Retrieved 14 October 2016.
  13. ^ "Tyson sells stake in plant-based meat maker Beyond Meat". Reuters. April 24, 2019. Archived from the original on 2019-04-24. Retrieved 2019-04-25.
  14. ^ Bronner, Stephen J. (2018-01-22). "With $72 million in funding, the entrepreneur behind Beyond Meat pursues innovation over profit". Entrepreneur. Archived from the original on 2021-02-03. Retrieved 2021-01-26.
  15. ^ "Snoop Dogg On How He Introduced Plant-Based Meat to His Family". The Beet. June 16, 2020.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  16. ^ Sprung, Shlomo (February 20, 2019). "DeAndre Jordan, Kyrie Irving, Chris Paul Invest In Plant-Based Food Company Beyond Meat". Forbes.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  17. ^ "Vegan-Friendly, Celeb-Backed Beyond Meat Has 2019's Best U.S. IPO". Time. May 2, 2019.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  18. ^ "Summary for Beyond Meat, Inc., BYND". Yahoo Finance. 30 July 2019. Archived from the original on 30 July 2019. Retrieved 31 July 2019.
  19. ^ Popper, Nathaniel (May 2, 2019). "Beyond Meat's Share Price Surges on First Day of Trading". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331.
  20. ^ Murphy, Mike (May 5, 2019). "Beyond Meat soars 163% in biggest-popping U.S. IPO since 2000". MarketWatch.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  21. ^ "Beyond Meat, Inc. (BYND) Valuation Measures & Financial Statistics". finance.yahoo.com.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  22. ^ "Beyond Meat craters after big Q1 earnings loss amid 'slow thaw' from COVID-19". money.yahoo.com. May 6, 2021.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  23. ^ Inc, Beyond Meat (2021-02-25). "Beyond Meat® Reports Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2020 Financial Results". GlobeNewswire News Room. {{cite web}}: |last= has generic name (help)CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  24. ^ "Beyond Meat acquires co-packer to tackle unit costs". Supply Chain Dive. November 11, 2020.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  25. ^ Watson, Elaine (29 June 2018). "Beyond Meat triples manufacturing footprint". foodnavigator-usa.com. William Reed Business Media. Archived from the original on 19 February 2020. Retrieved 7 July 2018.
  26. ^ "Beyond Meat acquires co-packer to tackle unit costs". Supply Chain Dive. November 11, 2020.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  27. ^ White, Martin (June 11, 2020). "Beyond Meat expands plant-based meat production in Europe". www.foodbev.com.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  28. ^ Agomuoh, Fionna (April 7, 2021). "Beyond Meat Opens China Plant, First Facility Outside U.S." TheStreet.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  29. ^ Raphael, Rina. "Inside Beyond Meat's innovative future food lab". fastcompany.com. Archived from the original on 2019-10-25. Retrieved 2019-12-16.
  30. ^ Pomranz, Mike. "Beyond Meat's Massive New Lab Sounds Like Something Out of a Sci-Fi Novel". foodandwine.com. Archived from the original on 2019-12-16. Retrieved 2019-12-16.
  31. ^ Fool, Contributor Rhian Hunt The Motley (January 15, 2021). "Beyond Meat Leases Gigantic New Headquarters Building". www.nasdaq.com. {{cite web}}: |first= has generic name (help)CS1 maint: url-status (link)

Pinging MaynardClark, who helped me with the Ethan Brown (executive) page.

Thanks again, S at Beyond (talk) 16:13, 27 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]