Bridge2Food North America 2024: The Plant Base's key takeaways

Bridge2Food North America returned to the US this month (October 2024), combining its Course Americas and Summit Americas events into one jam-packed, three-day experience for the first time.

Held at the Lumber Exchange during a bright and sunny week in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the event took place from 8-10 October, kicking off with Course Americas on the Tuesday and following with the two-day Summit Americas on Wednesday and Thursday.

Course Americas provided an interactive deep dive into alternative protein product development, exploring cutting-edge technologies and hands-on workshops with industry specialists such as Bühler and Puris.

Meanwhile, Summit Americas featured a programme packed with insightful talks from key figures at companies like Cargill, Enough, General Mills and more, delving into a wide range of topics, from ingredients of the moment to regulatory challenges and retail strategies.

FoodBev Awards also teamed up with Bridge2Food North America for the first time this year, with Bridge2Food’s industry dinner on 9 October – held at the beautiful Nicolett Island Pavillion – providing the platform for FoodBev Media’s 2024 World Plant-Based Innovation Awards winners to be announced. You can read more about the winners here.

Read on to discover our key takeaways from the event…

Taste and texture still top the priorities list

While many consumers are factoring in more considerations when it comes to choosing which food products to buy – such as eco-friendliness and social responsibility – taste and texture are still the main drivers influencing purchasing decisions, closely followed by price and availability. This was highlighted by Joseph Balagtas, professor of agricultural economics and director of the Center for Food Demand at Purdue University, in a session exploring the economic impact of inflation and market trends on the alt-protein industry.

With consumers unwilling to sacrifice on taste and texture, but simultaneously remaining conscious of nutrition and labelling, manufacturers in the alt-protein space must keep innovating to find new ways to enhance the taste of plant-based alternatives while keeping ingredients labels consumer-friendly.

New clean label ingredient solutions and modern processing technologies will play a key role here, and consumers are slowly becoming more open to these technologies’ use. Research from Innova Market Insights, presented during the event, found that 35% of consumers globally said they’ll accept novel processing technologies if it means the food tastes better, or is more nutritious or sustainable.

Collaboration is key

During a panel discussion titled ‘Forging the path: Breakthroughs and hurdles in the alternative protein sector,’ the panellists discussed the importance of collaboration, emphasising that working together and creating valuable partnerships should be a priority as we seek to further the alt-protein industry.

John Gray, managing director at mycoprotein start-up Enough, drew from his extensive career background within the traditional meat industry to share insights into how the alternative protein category – which he refers to as ‘complementary’ proteins, rather than alternative – can reach its growth potential.

Gray pointed out that the meat industry collaborates “far more than we do in this sector,” highlighting the need for the alt-protein sector to balance competition with collaboration. Sarah Frick, managing director of plant-based meat alternatives at Cargill, echoed this by saying that companies should be seeking out partnerships that unlock unique synergies and allow for new opportunities to scale.

Funding challenges will continue

Current challenges facing start-ups and smaller companies looking to raise capital are no secret to the industry – it’s an undoubtedly difficult time, however as several of the event’s speakers were keen to point out, these issues are not unique to the alternative protein and plant-based industry.

Economic pressures have thrown up hurdles for businesses across food and beverages generally, including the meat sector, and the broader CPG industry is facing a tough funding environment. Fluctuations in investment are to be expected in the coming years we continue along this path, panellists noted during a session on ‘Where will investments go in 2025 amid a challenging funding environment?’.

Ben Happ, partner at advisory firm BERA, expressed again the importance of partnerships – with investments and acquisitions from larger companies set to be the “way forward” for many businesses in the industry. “The real natural home for most of these companies is going to be in larger existing companies,” he stated during the session.

Be prepared, know your customer

Stephanie Lind, founder at Elohi Strategic Advisors, delivered a thought-provoking session on the event’s final day, exploring why 85% of new CPG/food and beverage launches fail (according to Nielsen data).

Lind – whose experience includes roles at F&B giants PepsiCo, Sysco and Kerry, as well as leading global sales initiatives for alt-meat company Impossible Foods – emphasised that for many companies, lack of preparation is the reason for this failure. She highlighted that in many cases, sales teams are focused on the end consumer but not on the customer who they are directly dealing with, the customer making the vital decisions – such as retailers and foodservice establishments.

She advised that companies in the alt-protein space take care to ensure they know their customer and who they are selling to, as well as make continuous evaluations of their sales strategies based on execution feedback. She also highlighted the importance of investing in changing the company culture around innovation, and investing in your sales team to ensure team members are well equipped to sell alternative protein products.

Know how to communicate

Although consumers are becoming more open to modern technologies, there is still a way to go. While precision fermentation, for example, has been used in the food and pharmaceutical industry for decades, many consumers are still unfamiliar with this kind of technology and for many, unfamiliarity is linked with avoidance and feeling unsafe.

Knowing how to communicate about these technologies and their benefits, helping to educate and enabling consumers to feel informed, will be a vital skill for companies within the alternative protein industry as it looks to scale up, with ambitions to bring ingredients such as precision-fermented dairy proteins into the mainstream in future.

JP Frossard, VP and consumer food analyst at financial services group Rabobank, explained during a panel session: “There is a missed opportunity in how we formulate products and how we communicate what plant-based ingredients are in them.” For example, putting the focus on familiar, plant-based ingredients that consumers are used to, and educating consumers on the nutritional content of products – such as fibre content and gut health benefits – will help to bridge the gap and persuade shoppers to pick up something new.

“It's an evolution, not a revolution”

Many sessions over the course of the event delved into the challenges the industry is currently faced with – but despite this, the industry’s optimism and drive to overcome such challenges was evident, with a strong emphasis on keeping perspective and looking at the long-term picture.

During the ‘Forging a path’ panel, the panellists reminded attendees that the end goal of transforming the food industry and creating a more sustainable future will take years, but we should not lose sight of it despite the challenges we face.

As panellist Pete Speranza, founder of Brand Elevator, put it: “It’s an evolution, not a revolution.” Change will not happen overnight, and progress won’t always look linear, but we should still celebrate it and push for lasting success as we seek to unlock the alt-protein industry’s full potential.