Fats & oils

Keto-friendly cereal Magic Spoon raises $5.5m in seed funding

12-Sep-2019 By Elaine Watson

Direct to consumer cereal brand Magic Spoon has raised $5.5m in a seed funding round led by Lightspeed Venture Partners as it seeks to take its keto-friendly wares to a wider audience.

Socati launches two CBD products 'that behave just like any other food ingredient' for the CPG market

27-Aug-2019 By Mary Ellen Shoup

Socati Corp., a processor of broad spectrum hemp extracts, has launched two CBD products for the CPG industry containing a minimum of 80% CBD and 4% of the minor cannabinoid cannabigerol (CBG) with non-detectable levels of THC.

IQ Bar raises $1m to meet exploding distribution, support new product launches & drive velocity

27-Aug-2019 By Elizabeth Crawford

Unlike some fundraising companies that want to accumulate as much financial support as possible, the founder of the Boston-based brain and body nutrition company IQ Bar wants just enough to help him fill his obligations and fuel the next round of growth...

Scientists create butter-like spread with 80% water

21-Aug-2019 By Mary Ellen Shoup

Cornell University food scientists have created a low-calorie butter-like spread that consists of 80% water and minuscule drops of vegetable oil and milk fat, mimicking the look and texture of dairy butter without the use of artificial stabilizers.

JUST, Inc CEO: ‘The company is JUST Egg, and JUST Egg is the company’

21-Aug-2019 By Elaine Watson

JUST Egg - a plant-based scrambled egg alternative made with mung bean protein – is already outperforming conventional eggs in some accounts, and is now the #1 priority at JUST, Inc given the size of the addressable market, says CEO Josh Tetrick: “Right...

Atlantic Natural Foods: Shelf-stable is area of untapped opportunity for plant-based meat, poultry, seafood

20-Aug-2019 By Elaine Watson

While the shelf-stable market for plant-based meats and eggs is small compared with the frozen and chilled segments, it represents an area of significant untapped opportunity, says Atlantic Natural Foods (ANF), which is gaining traction in this market...

Keto-friendly cereal Catalina Crunch generating almost a million in direct to consumer revenues a month, a year after launch

19-Aug-2019 By Elaine Watson

If super low carb, zero-sugar, keto-friendly cereal sounds like a super niche opportunity, think again, says Catalina Crunch founder and CEO Krishna Kaliannan, who is already generating “close to a million in monthly sales” via his website just a year...

The Bubbies mochi brand is on fire, says CEO: ‘This year our business will be 4x larger than when we acquired the company two years ago’

08-Aug-2019 By Elaine Watson

If growth in the frozen novelties category has not set the world on fire in recent years, one shiny bright spot in the market has been mochi: portable ice cream bites encased in chewy sweet rice dough that are lighting up retailers’ freezer cabinets,...

60-second interview: NSF International updates Non-GMO certification program

05-Aug-2019 By Elaine Watson

NSF International has just updated its Non-GMO certification scheme and logo. FoodNavigator-USA (FNU) caught up with Sarah Krol (SK), global managing director of food safety product certification to find out what this means... and whether firms are ready...

NEWS IN BRIEF

Plant-based burger orders up 10% at quick-service restaurants, says The NPD Group

26-Jul-2019 By Mary Ellen Shoup

Plant-based burger orders are on the rise at quick-service restaurants (QSR), up 10% (228 million orders) for the year ending in May 2019 compared to same period last year, reports The NPD Group.

Bobo’s raises $5.5m to expand oat bar empire, predicts 40% growth in 2019

22-Jul-2019 By Elaine Watson

The bar category is awash with increasingly sophisticated functional offerings engineered to deliver a fixed amount of protein, net carbs, or the latest on-trend ingredient, says the CEO of Bobo’s, which makes oat bars he readily admits “anyone could...

4th & Heart raises $7.6m, gears up for September launch of egg, collagen and ghee WOKE bar

08-Jul-2019 By Elaine Watson

4th & Heart - best known for its grass-fed ghee – has closed a $7.6m series C funding round led by Harbinger Ventures, with support from Cambridge Companies SPG, Blueberry Ventures, Boulder Food Group, Monogram Capital Partners, Finn Capital Partners,...

‘Chaos’ looms if olive oil, cheese, hit with retaliatory tariffs over Airbus dispute, warn US importers

01-Jul-2019 By Elaine Watson

As a 15-year-long dispute between the US and the EU over subsidies paid to European aircraft suppliers comes to a head, importers warn retaliatory tariffs on a host of products from the EU could wreak havoc on the specialty foods market, potentially doubling...

Soup-To-Nuts Podcast: How ingredient suppliers and distributors are stepping up to fill an innovation void

21-Jun-2019 By Elizabeth Crawford

When large food companies began cutting back on in-house R&D in favor of investing in startups’ with promising ideas, some either didn’t factor in or miscalculated the resources and time needed to scale-up their acquisitions before seeing returns...

FDA approves qualified claims on omega-3s and their ability to lower blood pressure

20-Jun-2019 By Hank Schultz

The US Food and Drug Administration has approved a list of qualified health claims for omega-3 fatty acids and their effect on blood pressure, culminating a five year plus effort on the part of industry.