- Competition is heating up in plant-based meat, especially after Beyond Meat's IPO and numerous restaurant partnerships have caught the eye of investors and consumers.
- Plant-based meat is a trend that's catching on big time and could grow to be a $140 billion industry, according to Wall Street analysts.
- Now, a number of traditional companies are getting in the plant game and launching competitors to Beyond Meat.
- Read more on Markets Insider.
Plant-based meat has blown up this year, especially after Beyond Meat's blockbuster IPO that sent shares up more than 800%. Amid the fervor, a number of high-profile restaurant partnerships have kept alternative plant-based foods in the spotlight.
It looks like a trend that isn't going away anytime soon, especially given the number of traditional food processing companies that are jumping into the plant-based meat alternative pool.
Competition is heating up in the plant-based protein industry, now worth $14 billion in the US, that Wall Street thinks could grow to be worth $140 billion.
Consumers are rushing to try the alternative foods in a number of fast food restaurants, and data show that they're willing to pay higher prices for the products. Dunkin, Tim Hortons, Subway and Del Taco all offer plant-based meat on menus.
Even Lewis Hamilton, a Formula One champion, has invested in a fast-food chain that will offer all plant-based foods including Beyond Burgers - the first location opened in London in September, Bloomberg reported.
Beyond Meat has set its sights even higher than the $140 billion projection. The goal is to take on the $270 billion US meat industry, the company said in an investor presentation. Measuring off the market share that plant-based milk has captured from dairy milk, Beyond Meat thinks it could capture 13% or $35 billion of the traditional meat market.
It's a tall order, especially as animal protein consumption is on track for a record year in 2019 and 2020, Don Close, a senior analyst of animal protein at Rabobank, told Markets Insider.
But the popularity and consumer demand for proteins derived from plants cannot be ignored, and a number of more traditional food processing companies have launched plant-based brands or invested in smaller companies creating plant-based fare.
Here are 6 companies that have launched products competing with Beyond Meat: