Beyond Meat expands at Walmart in new deal
While Walmart (WMT) fights with Oracle (ORCL) to close the deal on TikTok, it has signed off on allowing a full-scale battle for the stomachs of plant-based food eating Americans down its frozen food aisle.
Beyond Meat (BYND) announced Tuesday a new deal with Walmart that will see its distribution at the retailer rise to 2,400 stores from 800 currently. The expansion comes after the plant-based meat seller debuted a value pack at Walmart this summer, when it dubbed its most affordable product yet.
“Walmart has been a terrific partner and we’re excited to strengthen that partnership in depth and breadth as we look to offer more Beyond Meat products at more Walmart locations, furthering our commitment to increasing accessibility of plant-based meat,” said Beyond Meat Chief Growth Officer Chuck Muth in a statement.
Beyond Meat products initially launched at Walmart in 2015. Since then, Beyond Meat has become a public company (May 2019) amid aggressive expansion at restaurants and supermarkets globally. It now sports a market cap of $9.5 billion.
Rival Impossible Foods has also upped its game with the world’s largest retailer of late, too.
The company announced in June its Impossible Burger is now available at 2,100 U.S. Walmart locations.
Seeing as Walmart has about 5,300 U.S. stores, the opportunity for expansion for Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods at the retailer remains strong. If each player could continue to bring down prices for its products to cater to Walmart’s customers, it’s likely offerings from both companies will be available nationwide at the retailer in the not too distant future.
Brian Sozzi is an editor-at-large and co-anchor of The First Trade at Yahoo Finance. Follow Sozzi on Twitter @BrianSozzi and on LinkedIn.
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