ADM Accelerates Animal-free Dairy Strategy With New Culture
Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) is digging deeper into the animal-free dairy market through a new partnership with Bay Area-based food tech company New Culture. The alliance will accelerate development and commercialization of New Culture’s animal-free dairy products, beginning with a mozzarella variety.
That product reflects an increased focus on new innovations. The partnership gives the dairy company access to ADM’s product development resources and portfolio of sustainability-focused and plant-based ingredients and flavors. Additionally, ADM said it will support the company with production capabilities for both its precision fermentation and animal-free cheese-making operations as it builds out a portfolio of products.
“Once we have our animal-free casein in-hand, we employ traditional cheesemaking methods to produce any cheese we want,” said Matt Gibson, New Culture co-founder and CEO. “We are first launching with animal-free mozzarella, but the beauty of our casein is that any cheese is possible and can be made completely animal-free.”
The partnership also works to ADM’s benefit, expanding its presence in animal-free dairy by building on its 2018 partnership with Perfect Day. While Perfect Day creates animal-free whey proteins, New Culture’s focuses solely on animal-free casein, but both are made through the same process. Earlier this year, ADM announced it would invest $300 million to expand its alternative protein production facility in Decatur, Illinois.
“ADM is a global leader in the fast-growing alternative protein segment, and we’re excited to continue to expand our capabilities,” said Ian Pinner, ADM’s senior VP of strategy and innovation, in a press release. “After tasting New Culture’s delicious animal-free mozzarella, we recognized that the company had the potential to play a central role in bringing great-tasting, break-through products to the dairy aisle, and we’re excited to bring our global precision fermentation and manufacturing expertise, and our extensive consumer product application capabilities to this effort.”
In order to get to the dairy aisle, New Culture is looking first to test the product in foodservice. The company plans to roll out its animal-free mozzarella through a range of partnerships with pizzerias nationwide in 2023.
“Mozzarella is the #1 cheese consumed in the US, primarily through food service… However, existing alternatives to conventional mozzarella simply aren’t getting the job done for mainstream consumers,” said Gibson. “So, we decided to launch in pizzerias to maximize our impact and meet rising – albeit still unmet – consumer demand.”
Currently, the U.S. conventional dairy industry is valued at over $70 billion, nearly one-third of which are cheese products. However, while the plant-based dairy category is leading the market growth compared to meat alternatives, plant-based cheeses have not garnered as much momentum. Products including alt-frozen novelties, butter and yogurt have all garnered higher dollar sales than cheese alternatives, according to data from SPINS and IRI. This leaves an opportunity for animal-free products, which fall in that middle ground between conventional and vegan, to grab space.
Although animal-free proteins aren’t considered plant-based since the proteins replicate that of dairy cows, the products coming to market tap into consumer demands for more sustainable products that, according to Pinner, don’t compromise on taste. New Culture said that cheese production requires the most water of any dairy product and ranks third in greenhouse gas emissions and land use. It estimates its animal-free cheese contributes ten times less land and water use as well as greenhouse gas emissions.
