Earlier this week, Beyond Meat turned heads with its brand new chicken tenders in the U.S., but now, it's going after a much bigger whale:
China.
"But Beyond Meat was already in China?"
That's true. Beyond Meat has been expanding its Chinese operations over the past year, recently releasing its plant-based pork product in the region -- China is the largest pork consumer on the planet. This move comes in the hope of capitalizing on the current worries of the pork industry, where an outbreak of swine flu can disrupt distribution, as occurred last year.
But that's not all!
The biggest and boldest move is left for last. Beyond has just expanded its retail segment in a big way by launching an online store with Chinese e-commerce company JD.com yesterday. Beyond Meat believes that the move will help expand its products across the region rapidly at a time where interest in meat alternatives has never been higher.
Initially, online sales direct-to-consumer (DTC) will only be available in four major cities, including Beijing and Shanghai, but will eventually expand to 300 cities across China.
Online fresh food is a massively growing industry in China, with 2021 sales expected to be in the region of $45 billion to $50 billion -- up 18% year-over-year.
Although Beyond Meat faces stiff competition in the region from the likes of Nestle, on top of a generally slow move over to plant-based products from Chinese consumers, it is certainly an exciting growth opportunity. An opportunity that will no doubt be aided by the fact it just opened its first Beyond Meat products only end-to-end manufacturing plant outside of the U.S in China.
Watch this space.
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