We Drive Down Demand

While the horrors of industrial animal agriculture are all too real, there is hope. Plant-based eating is becoming more mainstream. Major food companies are investing in plant-based products, resulting in a wider range of offerings, including plant-based meats and dairy-free versions of milk, cheese, ice cream, yogurt, and more. Many traditional brands are launching plant-based lines—and advertising them as such. Around the globe, restaurants and fast-food chains are adding more-substantial plant-based options to their menus. Coffee shops like Starbucks are serving and promoting drinks made with plant milk by default.

Cows’ milk consumption has been declining for decades in the United States, while plant-based milks have grabbed 13% market share. Plant-based meats are not only offered on restaurant menus all over the world but consistently draw crowds of vegans and meat eaters alike. Cultivated meat—grown by farming animal cells rather than live animals—is gaining more funding and support, and in Singapore customers can order it from restaurants and food-delivery apps.

These strides in the plant-based economy are too great to be ignored. The shift toward a kinder, more sustainable food system is well underway, and industries will adapt or perish.

We strive to normalize plant-based eating and thus reduce demand for animal products. We have three primary approaches.

First, we partner with governments that buy food in large quantities with taxpayer dollars for places such as parks, hospitals, prisons, schools, and government buildings. Purchasing policies can require or encourage these places to increase their plant-based fare and reduce the meat, dairy, and eggs served.

Second, we move major restaurant chains, such as Subway and Johnny Rockets, to add plant-based entrees to their menus. We also collaborate with coffee shops like Starbucks to support them in offering drinks made with plant milk by default. Some companies we support replace animal ingredients altogether, while others commit to reducing their use of them.

The third area of this work, which is relatively new for us, is based on the theory of social clusters. Social clusters are groups of individuals within a larger network—people who are closely connected through common interests and activities or relationships, such as friendships or family ties. These individuals often share behaviors, values, and norms. To see whether relationships are more important than reach to our messaging, we are targeting select social clusters. We believe that the people in our targeted clusters are more likely than others to make changes in food choices. We expect their close ties to reinforce these changes among them and help create a critical mass of plant-based consumers in each cluster. Through relationships between individuals in these clusters and those in others, the changes will gain legitimacy and spread.