[Disclosure: AgFunderNews‘ parent company AgFunder is an investor in Juicy Marbles.]
Juicy Marbles—a Slovenian startup making plant-based whole cuts—has teamed up with Austrian startup Revo Foods to launch a mycoprotein-based fish filet called Kinda Cod, the first in a new line of curated products made with partners dubbed ‘Juicy Marbles & Friends.’
Kinda Cod will be sold into the US through Juicy Marbles’ online store, with UK and EU releases to follow.
Pitched as “the answer to breaded, rubbery fish alternatives,” Kinda Cod is a raw, unseasoned product made using Revo Foods’ high-throughput 3D printing technology. It has 130mg DHA and 82mg EPA omega-3 fatty acids per serving and serves as an excellent source of vitamin B12, B6, dietary fiber, and folate.
“Much of the plant-based fish market is dominated by breaded filets, fish sticks, or eerily translucent, rubbery alternatives,” said Juicy Marbles cofounder and R&D chief Maj Hrovat. “But when we cooked Revo’s Cod, it flaked into tender pieces like a proper filet.”
Revo Foods: ‘A clear win win’
The partnership is the first of many and will allow Juicy Marbles to broaden its offering without spending precious capital on capex, said cofounder Luka Sincek. “Juicy Marbles & Friends will be a selection of amazing products that suit all different tastes, health goals, and price ranges, making plant-based whole cuts more accessible than ever. This wouldn’t be possible if we insisted on doing everything in-house.”
“A ton of startups founded in 2020 and 2021 tried to do everything themselves,” said Revo Foods CEO Robin Simsa. “Sadly, many faced challenges because it’s too capital intensive. Our collaboration with Juicy Marbles is a prime example of how partnership can bring the whole field forward by allowing startups with different strengths to focus on their core expertise.
“This collaborative mindset is key to ushering in a new, more mature era for the plant-based industry.”
He added: “Looking back at the past years in the alt protein space, there was too much hype, too heavy capex expenses and too many companies focused for years on R&D without actually making revenues. This collaboration is a prime example of how the field can move forward.
“Revo Foods developed an amazing new structuring technology, which works really well for filet-type products. We are strong in Europe, but did not build distribution in the US. Juicy Marbles built an amazing brand, and an awesome D2C business in the US. So it’s a clear win-win: We can focus on our technology/production, and Juicy Marbles can offer another product that their customers in the US are actually waiting for. I would hope that more collaborations like these will emerge in the alt protein space, because probably at one point there were just too many startups/companies all trying to do the same thing.”
Eyeing profitability despite US retail delay
Juicy Marbles, which is known for its quirky marketing, is now in almost 4,000 stores in multiple European markets, with major retail accounts including Tesco, Sainsbury, Waitrose, Whole Foods, Billa, Migros and Lidl, said cofounder and CEO Tilen Travnik, who is aiming to achieve profitability this year as the startup achieves greater economies of scale. The company has a range of products on the market, from its most popular marbled filet steak to boneless ribs.
Plans to launch into US retail stores are on ice, however, Travnik told AgFunderNews. “Those plans were kind of thrown out the window with the tariffs [imposed by the Trump administration on products coming in from most countries]. So we’re doubling down on the direct-to-consumer business in the US, and retail will have to wait until things become clearer.”
The trough of disillusionment
While sales of meat alternatives are declining in many markets, Juicy Marbles is experiencing growth, albeit perhaps not at the “astronomical” pace that’s expected in the “VC-backed environment” in which many plant-based startups have had to operate, said Travnik.
“I think the market is being cleared of subpar products that don’t have the velocity [to justify their shelf space], which is going to result in the market looking smaller. But if you are a company in our position, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. We are happy to take a bigger percentage of a smaller market.”
In general, he said, alt meat companies are addressing two demographics: vegans and vegetarians, as well as flexitarians, with the latter not proving as enthusiastic about available options as they appeared to be in 2020 and 2021.
“Everybody placed the big bets on the flexitarians but we’re now, as an industry, learning that changing people’s dietary habits is more difficult than changing their religion.”
In times of economic or social anxiety, meanwhile, consumers also tend to stick with what they know, he added.
‘We are quite efficient’
Unlike some other players that raised huge sums of money on high valuations when interest rates were low and consumer and investor enthusiasm for alt protein was high, Juicy Marbles has raised only a very modest sum and has been very careful with its money, said Travnik.
“One of the things I think is wrong with the industry is that it was driven by so much tech. Everyone had to have their own tech stack, their own IP stack. But when you look at revenue per production employee, we are quite efficient. We don’t have much fancy equipment; our factory is not the shiniest that you’ve ever seen.”
Some of the other players in the space, meanwhile, overestimated the speed with which they would grow and built wildly expensive plants that are “only one quarter occupied,” he said.
Juicy Marbles has not disclosed what tech it uses to make its whole cuts, although Travnik has said in the past that it deploys “an extrusion-like process to texturize the protein,” with “the interesting parts” happening afterwards, “where we get the fibers, inject the fat and then color it and form it.”
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