Business Oscar Meyer to roll out vegan hot dogs, sausage with startup backed by Jeff Bezos

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Oscar Meyer to roll out vegan hot dogs, sausage with startup backed by Jeff Bezos​

Oscar Meyer is rolling out a plant-based hot dog and sausage this year with the help of a startup backed by Jeff Bezos.

The Kraft Heinz Company’s iconic brand is teaming up with TheNotCompany — a vegan-centered firm whose investors include Amazon’s billionaire founder — to introduce the “NotHotDog” and “NotSausage”, according to a statement from the company.

American consumers will have the option of plunking down $5.99 for a package of four plant-based hot dogs and $7.99 for four of the “NotSausages.”

In December 2022, Kraft Heinz and TheNotCompany jointly introduced a plant-based Philadelphia Cream Cheese to appeal to non-dairy-leaning consumers.

The Kraft-NotCo partnership has also yielded a plant-based “Kraft NotMac&Cheese” as well as alternative versions of mayonnaise (“NotMayo”) and cheese slices (“NotCheese Slices”).

Kraft Heinz, which is headquartered in Chicago and Pittsburgh, is banking on the popularity of the plant-based market to surge.

The conglomerate cited projections showing that sales of plant-based food products are estimates to rise from $8.3 billion in 2023 to $19 billion by 2030.

“We know people are hungry for plant-based meat options from brands they know and trust,” Kraft Heinz Not Company CEO Lucho Lopez-May said in a statement.

Judging from recent trends in the plant-based industry, Kraft Heinz has its work cut out for it in convincing consumers to ditch meat for good.

Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods have seen their share prices fall considerably since 2020.

The stock price of Beyond Meat, which reached a record high of nearly $235 a share in 2019, has plunged a whopping 96% since then.

Beyond Meat stock was trading at just north of $8 a share on Wednesday.

In the first nine months of 2023, the company’s US revenue dropped 34% on weak consumer demand.

Beyond Meat said in November it was cutting 19% of its workforce and considering cutting some products, like jerky, and reducing its operations in China.

The El Segundo, Calif.-based firm announced in late February that it was revamping its signature plant-based burger by reducing saturated fat by 60% thanks to a switch from canola and coconut oils to avocado oil.

The new products — Beyond Burger patties and Beyond Beef grounds — go on sale in the US this spring.

Inflation is one reason US buyers turned to cheaper sources of protein in recent years.

But US consumers’ doubts about the health of plant-based meat – fed partly by advertising from the meat industry – has also been a consistent problem.
 
  • Lunacy
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There will be a huge initial push for these with soyfaced soymales soyfacing on social media over it. Then nothing. They won't be tasty or affordable to the average consumer as opposed to the real thing.
 
If they're anything like Beyond Meat, they'll have the texture of erasers.
That's kind of hot dogs in general. I haven't tried Beyonds stuff because they're $$$ but I like Morning Star and a couple other brands of veggie dogs.

They're best pan-fried or grilled.

A lot of the people eating these new veggie meat alternatives aren't vegetarians, just older folks trying to reduce (but not completely elimate) consumption of beef and pork for health reasons. Lot of my old coworkers were like that.
 
  • Optimistic
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So, given that beyond meat sausages collapsed towards the lowest point of their packaging with remarkable consistency, how much filler is going to be required to keep these from becoming flatworm looking meat slabs when they get packaged?
But US consumers’ doubts about the health of plant-based meat – fed partly by advertising from the meat industry – has also been a consistent problem.
Ah yes, "partly", because I'm pretty sure it's fed mostly by the fact that meat substitutes are nearly always a rubbery oily mess that taste primarily of salt and thus okay-ish at best?
 
They can't be any worse than Corn King hotdogs.
 
So, given that beyond meat sausages collapsed towards the lowest point of their packaging with remarkable consistency, how much filler is going to be required to keep these from becoming flatworm looking meat slabs when they get packaged?

Ah yes, "partly", because I'm pretty sure it's fed mostly by the fact that meat substitutes are nearly always a rubbery oily mess that taste primarily of salt and thus okay-ish at best?
You can never have a sincere objection to their social engineering schemes. You're always being brainwashed or shilling for some faceless lobbying group.
 
There is no profit margin in cheap soy and yeast but when you mix it with a fuckton of salt, mystery chemicals, seed oils and red #5 you can charge meat prices for it. Goyslop perfected.

Don't eat this shit people, just eat oatmeal or something and save your cash for a real burger.
 
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Are they any good though? I don't eat pork, chicken, or beef so I'll try them if they're any good and aren't ridiculously expensive
Until this stuff gets more popular it will be comparatively more expensive than animal based products. I highly doubt that producing this stuff costs more than raising and feeding and housing animals, slaughtering and processing them, and flavoring and turning them into sausages. The markup on this 'vegan' stuff is probably outrageous. I say 'vegan' because half of the ingredients in these things usually read like a chemical textbook.
There is no profit margin in cheap soy and yeast but when you mix it with a fuckton of salt, mystery chemicals, seed oils and red #5 you can charge meat prices for it.
Pretty much. This stuff is marketed as 'vegan' and 'plant based' yet it's mostly chemical sludge and chemical dyes.
 
  • Agree
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A lot of the people eating these new veggie meat alternatives aren't vegetarians, just older folks trying to reduce (but not completely elimate) consumption of beef and pork for health reasons. Lot of my old coworkers were like that.
They’re often far worse for health. Not that processed cheap sausages are good for you either, but fakemeat is filled with some nasty stuff like high levels of emulsifiers that mess up your gut bacteria.
If they want to be healthier the alternatives are either decent quality sausages and burgers, or the old fashioned kind of veggie burger that was made from beans and veg patted together. None of the fake meat alternatives are in any way good for you. If you eat meat, make it as good quality as possible, and if you’re veggie, eat actual veg not the over processed slop.
 
I've added oats to meat to stretch it out when times were tough and it's way better than this slop.
 
They’re often far worse for health. Not that processed cheap sausages are good for you either, but fakemeat is filled with some nasty stuff like high levels of emulsifiers that mess up your gut bacteria.
And actual hot dogs aren't? To say nothing about how eating too much red meat gives you ass cancer.

Vid related-ish
 
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