Food Industry News, Insights, and Education for the CPG Community

Though the paleo diet has gained traction in categories such as sauces and snacks, there’s still space for convenient, clean meal options. Kevin’s Natural Foods wants to help fill that need to via a line of ready-to-eat, refrigerated paleo meals.

The eighteenth round of Elevator Talk Livestream features leaders from Quokka Brew, RIND Snacks, 3 Mountains Tea, Good Dee’s and Paleo Pro. This week’s special co-host is Trent Moffat, the owner of Gotham Brand Managers.

For Ben Pasternak, CEO and founder of plant-based chicken nugget brand NUGGS, the philosophy for launching a new brand is simple: “Whatever everyone else is doing, we should do the opposite.”

With Chobani Probiotic, a fermented plant-based drink, and Chobani Complete, a sub-line of protein-enhanced Greek yogurts and shakes, the Norwich, New York-based company is leveraging its brand equity to meet consumer demand for functional products, in this case gut health and on-the-go nutrition.

Gabrielle Union, Maggie Patton and Alex Buckley, co-founders of better-for-you kid’s snack brand Bitsy’s, spoke about the company’s mission to make nutritious snacks accessible to all families, communicating the brand’s healthy halo to children and parents, why asking for help has to be a priority for entrepreneurs and how the food industry can work together to mainstream healthy food for kids.

On this week’s Office Hours, NOSH editor Carol Ortenberg is joined by Chris Moe, co-founder & COO at ecommerce agency Cartograph, and Cambria Copeland, senior director of business management at online sales manager Beekeeper Marketing, for a discussion exploring how successful food and beverage companies can utilize retailing giant Amazon.

In a test of 200 CBD products the FDA found many contained CBD levels inconsistent with their labels — though not explicitly unsafe. The overall variability points (again) to what brands, researchers and advocacy organizations say is the bigger problem: lack of regulation in the budding industry.

On Tuesday, Oatly closed one of the largest food and beverage financing deals of the year when it announced a $200 million funding round led by Blackstone Growth. Speaking with BevNET, Oatly CEO Toni Petersson said the financing represents a diversification of the company’s ownership structure, bringing in an American firm that will work directly with its European and Asian arms.

In this week’s Checkout, retailers, including grocery chains Kroger and Publix, mandate masks for customers, technology platform Crisp raises $12 million in Series A funding and EWG studies glyphosate levels in chickpea products.

Greg Fleishman, co-founder and CEO of baking mix and snack company Foodstirs, discussed how the brand has adapted to a new consumer environment and why it’s critical to leverage every resource at your disposal during the pandemic.

In episode two of SprintToSuccess, we’ll be giving a glimpse into our sprint strategy process and show you how we applied it to Melissa’s brand and tackle some of her challenges. We cover surveying her competitive category, identifying a target, crafting positioning, and honing brand personality and tone.

Plant-based ice cream is a rising category and HumanCo wants to take a scoop. The holding company announced today that it had acquired the majority of plant-based ice cream company Coconut Bliss.

The FDA has “a new mindset” for managing the food system and on Monday released its New Era of Smarter Food Safety Blueprint. In an update last month, the FDA outlined the initiative, noting it had been tweaked based on the food supply chain’s challenges during the pandemic.

Moving from supplying brands to also helping create them, vegan “dairy” ingredient supplier Perfect Day announced an agreement in which it is investing in new brand The Urgent Company.