Investor Scene
It’s no secret that plant-based food sales have skyrocketed within the last 5 years. While Beyond Meat™ may be the first plant-based company that comes to mind, many others are coming up too – one of which includes BC-based Boosh Plant-Based Brands Inc. “Boosh Food” (CSE: VEGI). Boosh Food has been growing in popularity in Canada and are featured in grocery stores such as Metro. Their offerings are similar to Beyond Meat™, and they position themselves as selling easy, healthy, nutritionally balanced plant-based comfort food. They currently have six frozen product offerings that consist of single or double serving bowl-based entrees. They also have three refrigerated entrees that are expected to be in stores by the end of July.
Part of the reason that plant-based food has been rising in popularity is because of the Covid-19 pandemic. The pandemic appeared to expose the vulnerabilities of our animal-dependent food value chain, making people more reliant on plant-based protein. There was more than $930 million in funding put into the plant-based protein industry in the first quarter of 2021 alone. (https://gfi.org/press/record-824-million-invested-in-alternative-protein-companies-in-2019-930-million-already-invested-in-q1-2020/)
We’ve also seen plant-based milks, particularly oat milk, grow tremendously in popularity over the last few months.
Canada alone has seen a 113% spike in Vegan diet related google searches since 2016. (https://retail-insider.com/articles/2020/07/meat-free-and-vegan-consumer-base-grows-during-covid-19/) Moreover, the retail sales of meat substitutes in Canada are predicted to reach over 220 million U.S. dollars by 2022, an increase of over $100 million since 2015. (https://www.statista.com/statistics/981282/meat-substitute-sales-canada/)
Beyond Meat™ appears to be the most popular brand, but as plant-based diets increase, more brands make a case within the plant-based field. This includes the up and coming Boosh Plant-Based Brands Inc. (CSE: VEGI). Management at Boosh Food believe that plant-based diets will be a long-term trend rather than a fad due to environmental and ethical concerns of consumers.
Boosh has stated that most of their customers have regular animal based diets who want to try experimenting with more plant-based food – “flexitarians,” and that their main goal is to provide plant-based meals that are 100% trusted by the consumer. Their product offerings include frozen meals that are ready to simply “heat and eat”, and include pasta Bolognese Bowl, Mac n’ Cheese, Coconut Curry Bowl, Mexican fiesta Blow, Veggie Pot Pie, and award winning Shepherd’s Pie.
Boosh completed its IPO on May 27th and raised approximately $2.8 million. It opened at $.50 and in less than two weeks the stock trades at $1.30. With only approximately 15 million shares outstanding, of which management owns approximately 29%, we think that VEGI’s valuation may significantly increase over the next few years.
Let us know your thoughts on Boosh Plant-Based Brands Inc. (CSE: VEGI)
