I mentioned this on the NPI board but realize not everyone reads it. But there are a few things that are positive about BYND.
TAM. The worldwide meat industry is expected to grow to $1.5 trillion in 2022 as living standards worldwide continue to improve. Other countries are actually more open to the idea to plant based meats than Americans according to polls though the opportunity is still big here. In 2017 the US produced over $1 trillion in meat. This market is mind boggling in size compared to SaaS companies who probably overestimate their $25 billion TAM opportunities. It means BYND could hit $1 billion a year without batting an eye.
Gardenburger. Before the BYND IPO and since I looked at what happened to gardenburger as a case study. Gardenburger hired an executive from Quaker Oats who spent a large portion of their money on advertising. While the advertising helped with sales, as soon as funding for them wiped out, sales decreased significantly. The company wound up declaring bankruptcy a few years later. Gardenburger’s problem was 1) forced advertising on a simple product easy to duplicate which created unsustainable sales. 2) not branching out to other products and being a one hit wonder. BYND is neither of these. Their advertising spend pales in comparison and demand is viral. Also they are already branching out to other products.
Competitive Advantage. Bynd realizes their product sucks (pretty much the CEOs words, he knows he has work to do in that regard) so they continue to dump R&D to make a better product. They are supposed to have a new version of the burger available soon if not already. What they are doing or attempting to do is more difficult than a veggie burger and allows for competitive advantage.
I have never seen restaurants (ie more than one chain) advertising a certain product used as an ingredient. It suggests to me they either can’t or don’t feel it will be worth calling their food distributors and just buying generic plant based meat.
Hype. We humans seem to make a habit of following fads. Just look at all the people buying “gluten free” stuff as if there is suddenly an epidemic of celiac disease these days. Beyond prides themselves on being non-GMO.
Negatives
At this time I believe a lot of people have shorted BYND public float creating a short squeeze (these are the same type of investors who would buy a cigar butt because it’s cheap and will hopefully learn their lesson after this). It’s possible the rally can end after lockup expiration releasing more shares to the public.
It’s also possible that bynd can’t properly differentiate themselves from a generic plant based meat and all these restaurants going to beyond or impossible, as well as the consumer themselves, just switch to generic because generic (or the others coming into the mix like Tyson) is just as good. But right now bynd and impossible are by far in the lead.