Adrianne DeLuca

With snacks trending upward and vertically-integrated supply chains becoming increasingly appealing to large corporations amid continued market volatility, The Hershey Company is doubling down on both.

In this week’s roundup: Bel Group partners with food tech company Climax Foods; Farm.One reopens doors with a new investor, Fresh Thyme launches ecommerce platform and more.

The alt-dairy industry has staked a claim among nearly a third of American consumers and within that new wave of plant-based milks, a handful of brands are hoping to disrupt conventional thinking around how such products are packaged and sold.

Motif Foodworks will begin selling its finished alt-meat burger products direct-to-consumer for a limited time, representing a pivot for the company’s previously stated business plan.

PepsiCo’s first ever Greenhouse Accelerator: Juntos Crecemos Edition is intended to help drive growth for startup Hispanic-owned food and beverage businesses. This is the first time that the program has focused specifically on a social equity cause.

Deeming 17-year-old Michele’s Granola an overnight success would be both far-fetched as well as an understatement. But unexpected explosive growth amid the early days of the pandemic has propelled the Baltimore-based business forward at a time when founder Michele Tsucalas believed it may have been slowing down.

Seal The Seasons is one of the most recent brands to make staff cuts. As it implements additional cost cutting measures, the company expects these actions to bring the business to profitability this quarter.

Air dried meat snack company Stryve reported a 1.3% decline in net sales year-over-year to $5.4 million in Q4, largely due to the company’s SKU rationalization efforts and other cash conservation measures.

In this week’s roundup: A new report finds consumer perceptions of MSG are shifting, Nestle and Cargill invest $15 million into regenerative ag projects, Mila partners with Simu Liu, Faiir Initiative publishes warning for livestock producers and Last Crumb goes gluten-free.

Celebrity-backed Rob’s Backstage Popcorn announced the closing of a $7 million funding round today led by the VC firm of DJ and music producer Kygo, known as the Palm Tree Crew.