Voyage Foods Prioritizes Ingredient Supplier Role With Cargill Partnership

Food technology startup Voyage Foods is taking on a new role as an ingredient supplier, starting with an exclusive business-to-business partnership with Cargill.

The agreement, announced last week, will see Voyage Foods offering its peanut- and hazelnut-free spreads and cocoa-free chocolate innovations as climate-friendly and allergen-free ingredient solutions for Cargill customers. Along with distribution and logistics support, Cargill will also be leveraging its technical, sales and customer resources to Voyage as part of the deal.

“We are the customer facing team and Voyage is the expert technology team,” said Anne Mertens-Hoyong, Cargill category director of chocolate, confectionery and ice cream. “But behind that there’s Cargill. We have expertise on fats and oils and things like that, so there’s really a synergy in creating solutions for the customers.”

Voyage’s nut-free spreads and cocoa-free chocolate are value-adds for Cargill, particularly as cocoa supply issues in West Africa, rising demand and inflation have helped push prices to new heights this year. The Voyage Foods partnership helps Cargill control its costs in some aspects of its supply chain while adding more vegan and allergen-free ingredient options.

Yet Mertens-Hoyong was careful to add that these products will not be replacing their nut and cocoa counterparts. Voyage’s products will “extend” Cargill’s options in indulgence ingredients, she said. “There’s a lot of really valuable new innovations that are being brought here, not only on the sell side but also on the supply side.”

Cargill reached out to Voyage in 2021, just after the Oakland, California-based company emerged from “stealth mode” and announced its plans for making climate-friendly and allergen-free food options, said Voyage Foods co-founder and CEO Adam Maxwell. “When we started the end goal was focused on how can we create the most impact. And that was always as an ingredient and solutions provider for the greatest brands and food manufacturers in the world.”

The strategy seems to be working. Earlier this year, Rudi’s Rocky Mountain Bakery launched its new Uncrustables-like frozen Sandos that paired Voyage’s nut-free spreads with fruit jams on the bakery’s signature bread.

In the past, Voyage has said it intended to work as a private label supplier for c-stores or grocery distributors for its beanless coffee innovation but the company would not comment on how that original strategy has materialized. Voyage’s coffee alternative is not included in the Cargill partnership.

Voyage will continue to sell its branded products — primarily its nut-free spreads — in traditional retail but the partnership with Cargill opens up a much bigger business as a B2B supplier.

With Cargill, Voyage can leverage the food giant’s distribution network and customer list to scale its aspirations of being an ingredient supplier without having to dedicate too much time, labor and resources to building out sales and marketing teams.

That’s not to say that Voyage is not scaling. Last year, the company raised $22 million in an investment round that included new capital from previous investors Valor Equity Partners, Horizons Ventures, UBS O’Connor and Level One Fund. A new 300,000-square-foot production facility is scheduled to go online later this year.

Cargill’s interest reflects a cocoa-free chocolate category that’s beginning to heat up.

UK-based Win-Win (formerly WNWN Food Labs) was part of the Mondelēz CoLab Tech Accelerator and has been courting big food companies like Nestlé and Ferrero as a potential ingredient partner. Planet-A-Foods recently raised a fresh $15 million to scale production of its cocoa-free chocolate, ChoViva.