Foods for Tomorrow is accelerating toward international expansion by launching its plant-based meat alternative Heura in France with supermarket chain Franprix. This agreement allows the Barcelona-based company to offer plant-based alternatives to as many people as possible without sacrificing a culinary and nutritious experience. With this latest expansion, the start-up’s products are available in seven markets globally: France, Hong Kong, Singapore, Holland, Portugal, Andorra and Spain.
“Seventy-nine percent of French citizens do not follow a specific diet but 35 percent of them already admit to having reduced their consumption of meat in recent years,” says Bernat Añaños, Co-Founder of Foods for Tomorrow. “Heura offers a nutritious and tasty alternative for people seeking to reduce their meat consumption and adopt a more plant-based diet, without giving up on flavor and taste,” he explains.
Añaños highlights that the arrival “responds to a huge demand for plant-based meat products all over France.”
“All around the world, the demand for plant-based meats is undercovered right now. People want to have new options connected to their values and needs and we want to help them by offering meaty, tasty and nutritious plant-based meat. The alternatives on the market until recently were tofu and very few people know how to cook it well,” Añaños comments.
Markets are moving in a positively plant-based direction, he continues, but very few countries have a culinary heritage like France. “Gastronomy is a huge pillar in French culture and eating is an indulgence act. Their respect and love for food makes French customers one of the most exigent ones and that’s why we focus on this market,” he further explains.
“With already so many dishes and a rooted food culture in France, it can be challenging to offer new options, but we arrive confident into the market and with a huge respect to its gastronomic culture. We want to show this market that Heura is a real alternative to meat that will allow them to maintain their passion for food,” Añaños affirms.
Heura allows consumers to introduce plant-based meat options in a very simple way, as if you were cooking chicken. “French consumers will be able to keep preparing their favorite dishes in plant-based versions,” he adds. “What you can do with traditional meat, you can do it with Heura. If you stir fry, oven or roast Heura, you will get a different experience.”
The Mediterranean culinary heritage is present in all the Heura products; with clean recipes that have already been recognized with the “Saveur de L’année 2020” award. The first two products available in the French market are the Original and Mediterranean frozen chunks.
In Spain, the company has large distribution agreements with well-established companies in the market, such as Carrefour, and already reaches 2,500 points of sale. Besides its retail strategy for distribution in France, the company plans to introduce its product in the food service industry there as it has already done in other countries.
Foods for Tomorrow finished 2019 with a turnover of €2.5 million (US$2.7 million) and wants to heavily bet on its internationalization to keep multiplying its figures in 2020. Añaños further highlights that his company was “born to offer 100 percent plant-based alternatives that do not mean a sacrifice, now that the time has come to bring this culinary experience to as many people as possible and as fast as we can with a rapid international expansion.”
“Our innovation team is getting ready to launch the whole range of the favorite meat formats, but in the Heura plant-based version. Always based on our pillars: clean-label, nutritious and tasty,” he concludes.
