What you need to know:

• CSIRO sees a $13bn plant-based protein market in Australia. Which is why the government’s science and research agency, along with Hungry Jack’s Jack Cowin, backed V2food’s 2019 launch.
• Investors also spied pay dirt, with ‘alt-meat’ firms like Beyond Meat soaring on stock market debuts. The problem is sales have since slowed and valuations collapsed.
• Shoppers are feeling the pinch locally and globally – and plant-based protein tends to be more expensive than meat.
• The category in Australia has therefore slowed. But V2food is spending big in an attempt to reverse category fortunes, though marketing boss Jade Lish said it is faring far better than rivals, still notching 50 per cent YoY growth.
• While she’s a fan of retail media, Lish has convinced the board to instead go hard on brand after a South Australia trial saw sales soar 80 per cent via a tonne of new buyers.
• For the next 12 months, it's upper funnel or bust in a bid to target circa 6m “reducer-tarian” Australians actively trying to eat less meat.
• Lish is going for excess share of voice, or ESOV, as pressured rivals pull in their horns.
• But if she can grow the category, everybody wins.

Lightly seared on the reality grill

Alt-meat was red hot a few years ago. Investors piled in. Beyond Meat came close to a $14bn market cap in 2019. Now it’s less than $750m, with the firm this month cutting revenue forecasts on the back of weak sales – despite discounting. Meanwhile, employees at rival Impossible Foods have seen the value of their share options decimated.

The collapse coincides with squeezed incomes in key markets – and meat alternatives usually cost more than the real thing.

Jade Lish, Head of Marketing ANZ at V2food, said Australia is far from immune as cost pressure bites. But the brand, backed by Jack Cowin and sold within Hungry Jack's as well as supermarkets, is still powering. Now Lish aims to turn up the heat on rivals and become “the undisputed plant-based leader” in Australia.

“Growth has softened for the category,” she told Mi3. “But V2food continues to grow 50 per cent year-on-year.”

Some of that growth resilience is because it’s already cheaper than rivals. Burgers are the key battleground, making up circa 30 per cent of V2food’s sales, and where Beyond Burgers is currently selling in Woolworths at $11 for two, a four pack of V2 burgers costs $9. Lish said it’s the same story for other competitors. “Everyone else has a two-pack and a very high dollar per kg … So we’re not seeing a huge impact [from price crunched consumer drop-off],” she said. “We are doing everything we can to reduce our price to get closer to meat.”

More brand, less bland

Beyond cost, a growth barrier is that the brand, launched in 2019, lacks a bit of positional flavour. Recent brand perception work (via Qualtrics) returned “neutral” status, per Lish. “We joked that we didn’t stand for anything,” she said. But the firm spun that into a positive. “That means we have a blank canvas to work with. It’s such an early category in terms of building a strong brand.”

Plus, it gave Lish the ammo to unlock brand-building firepower. After a state-wide trial in South Australia drove “phenomenal results” with 80 per cent sales lift, and attracting “two out of three shoppers who were new to the category”, she got seven figures from the board to go national.

Hence launching the ‘update your plate’ campaign this week, with celebrity chef Miguel Maestre fronting it. “He's such a shortcut to a fun, vibrant brand personality,” said Lish.

Half the budget is going on TV, circa 30 per cent on out of home and the rest on social media – a slightly lower ratio for the platforms than V2food’s SA trial, because national TV costs more.

Never mind the vegans

The aim is to capture the one in three Australians who are “actively reducing” meat consumption (Lish calls them “reducer-tarians”) rather than targeting vegans, because it’s a far bigger prize, circa 6 million Australian adults. Only about 2 million of them are currently shopping in the plant-based category, “giving us a 4 million opportunity – and that’s who we’re going after,” said Lish.

“Yes, a large proportion of sales is coming from vegan and vegetarian [shoppers] but our greater growth and absolutely where we're targeting is people who are reducing – and that's exactly what this campaign is designed to do.”

Whopper sales boosted

V2food’s burgers are sold in Hungry Jack's in Australia and New Zealand ­– no surprise given Jack Cowin’s on the board. But in the US Burger King is aligned with rival Impossible Foods, and with Unilever's Vegetarian Butcher in Europe and elsewhere. “Would we like to be global? I’m sure we’d love to. But I don’t even know where that contract sits,” said Lish. “That’s definitely a CEO and Jack conversation.”

Either way, just changing the name of the burger within Hungry Jack's – from Rebel Whopper to Plant Based Whopper – has driven double-digit restaurant sales uplift since June, per Lish, which suggests appetite for plant-based food remains buoyant.

Is there scope to use Hungry Jack’s within the broader retail environment, i.e. on branding for supermarket packaging and promotion? “I’m sure we would love to,” said Lish. “Is it feasible? Unlikely.”

Brand vs. retailer media

Right now, V2food’s burger sales are roughly 50:50 from Hungry Jack’s versus retail, “whereas before HJ’s was leading the way”, said Lish. The firm is pushing new lines into stores, schnitzels, tenders, popcorn bites and the like, with “quite a large range launched into Coles” over the last year.

Does that mean V2food will be spending more marketing budget with Coles 360, the retailer’s media arm?

In short, “no”, per Lish. Earlier this year she indicated the brand would increase investment with retailer media players if they could “show me the data”. But she also said V2food needed to spend more on brand building, “and here I am, launching an amazing upper funnel campaign,” said Lish.

“We're going after our top target audience, but also broad reach. That's exactly what we need to do to turn around the category performance as well as drive brand growth – and that's what we're here to do.”

Will brand building be her focus for the foreseeable?

“For the next 12 months, yes.”

If Lish's ESOV plan works as rivals pull in their horns, Australia could yet write an alternative alt-meat narrative.