HEALTHY TAKE-AWAY ON SUBSCRIPTION - delicious, organic, plant-based food in season whenever you need it. To promote good health of the European Union’s population.

Project Information

SIMPLE FEAST

Grant agreement ID: 775897

DOI

10.3030/775897

Project closed

EC signature date 15 May 2017

Start date 1 June 2017

End date 30 September 2017

Funded under

• INDUSTRIAL LEADERSHIP - Leadership in enabling and industrial technologies - Information and Communication Technologies (ICT)

Total cost

€ 71 429,00

EU contribution

€ 50 000,00

Coordinated by

FEAST KITCHEN APS
Denmark

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - SIMPLE FEAST (HEALTHY TAKE-AWAY ON SUBSCRIPTION - delicious, organic, plant-based food in season whenever you need it. To promote good health of the European Union’s population.)

Reporting period: 2017-06-01 to 2017-09-30

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

Our ambition is to inspire European consumers to change their eating habits. We believe that the next wave in foods are a slowly transition into plants, as plant-based alternatives can both improve people’s lives and help our planet. Unfortunately, today, it’s a lot more convenient to eat unhealthy food because fast-food and processed food is readily available everywhere providing unparalleled convenience.

To solve this enormous problem, one must create an offering that makes it more convenient to eat healthily than the opposite and that demands a solution.
The Simple Feast solution that we are bringing to market consists of two things. 1. Innovative, plant-based organic food that matches human being’s nutritional challenges from anything from auto-immune diseases to life-style conditions 2. A subscription service with changing monthly menus and seamless integration to premium content in our app on days where you have time to cook.

This type of health on a formula product is one of its kind and its novelty will contribute to a higher European market share of the global digital and organic plant-based fast-food markets. The plant-based industry shows no sign of stopping or even slowing down. Reports predict that flexitarianism is going to be one of the biggest food trends in 2017 as it is a more viable way for people to cut down on meat.

Simple Feast has also set out to address global challenges, such as the environmental impact, CO2 foot prints and having a healthy population - by promoting not only a healthy, but also a sustainable mind set - including less meat consumption, zero food waste, organic packaging and 100% organic food.

The SME instrument programme facilitated an extensive market attractiveness study and supported our proof of concept activities. By the end of the project, our products had been very well received and market response was overall positive. A steady MoM average growth rate of +25% and Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR) amount of new customers per month tell that there is indeed a market for Simple Feast and that customers have been feeling a need for our solution.

At project end Simple Feast will seek further investments from SME instrument Phase 2, and prepare for market launch in Sweden, France, and US. Furthermore, an even more detailed product portfolio has also been developed during the project.

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

The work performed is aligned with the grant agreement annex 1 and the project objectives. The following tasks were implemented:

Task 1 - Market analysis and test of chosen subscription-based business model (Objective: Investigate key market aspects and liaison with stakeholders, namely potential investors and close dialogue and community-building activities with our consumers.)
The product strategy was shaped through a two-way market approach: Physical food delivered to your door step and intelligently tailored nutritional diet profiles in the app. Customers choosing Simple Feast receive a whole experience of healthy eating options, both for when you’re cooking yourself and when you’re pressed for time.
In terms of validation of the subscription model on our physical food, the main conclusion is that having 25% subscribers retained after 6 months is a positive result that validates the subscription approach.

Task 2 - Modify solution setup (Objective: Ensure high quality user experience and a coherent user flow from app to ecommerce site through extensive testing)
Simple Feast has put a lot of effort into creating a unique user experience, ensuring that both the existing app user and the new customer would enjoy the whole experience - from ordering the monthly dishes, to receiving the box at home (both delivery and packaging), to preparing the dish for dinner, eating it and using the app alongside for both inspiration and as a nutritional coach.
The customer insights gathered during the project is of utmost importance, as we have adjusted our products several times during the implementation phase, based on customers’ feedback - this has led to a much higher satisfaction rate and returning customers.

Task 3 - Food development (Objective: Development of +20 organic healthy mainly plant-based dishes for a variety of different taste).
The strategy for the development and invention of the dishes was clear: At first our chef Anders Vald would prepare 8 dishes (4 dishes per month) and we would test the set-up and modify it accordingly to the evaluation results.
We have developed a research food lab, where the chefs test and develop new interesting dishes, prior to putting it in large-scale production.

Task 4 - Marketing and branding (Strong community building activities, including extensive dissemination)
Our overall promotion objective is to change the way we eat by building a distinctive and high quality food brand.
A substantial amount of effort has been allocated to our marketing activities, in order to test different campaign approaches and promotion strategies for Simple Feast. Overall, we can divide our dissemination activities into two main categories: On social media and in real life.
During the project period, Simple Feast has been invited to interesting events and physical promotion activities - which highly facilitated the dissemination of our brand and products. We were invited to cook at the Stockholm Symposium´s global leadership conference, as well as the Roskilde Music Festival Artist village.

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

Although the Danish market is relatively small compared to just some of our close neighbors such as, Germany and United Kingdom - the market is quite interesting as a range of different segments is available, making it a perfect test market. The additional added value is that Simple Feast’ headquarter is based in Copenhagen and everyone involved has extensive market knowledge from previous work.

Our market launch strategy was to test covering all of Denmark, having the hypothesis that the major cities, such as Copenhagen and Aarhus would account for most of the sale. This is also where our target group is based. Our assumption was validated to be correct. Most sales were from the Copenhagen area.

The added value for the customers lies within our full integrated experience, which can be tailored to individual preferences.
We consider our App as the competitive advantage combined with the meal subscriptions service.
As we want not only to offer a unique source of inspiration on how to cook delicious food, but a healthy alternative to take-away on days where you don’t have time to cook.

We are building a company and a business case - but we have as the overall aim to help raise awareness of the impact of food and eating habits on the climate and what individuals can do to reduce their CO2 footprint. Moreover, our packaging is completely sustainable and biodegradable.
In terms of communication, there are both climate and health benefits to eating plant-based, but it can be complicated to communicate both at the same time. Thus, we have decided to first and foremost focus on food’s impact on climate change. This is a very clear and strong message with not many other food options out there. Hopefully, when you buy into this agenda, you will be reinforced in your decision when you learn about all the health benefits of our food.

With this focus, an obvious thought is if we should go all vegan. A lot of CO2 emissions go into the production of meat, but also into the production of dairy products. For now, we will have both vegetarian and vegan options, but try to keep down the amount of dairy products in the vegetarian meals. It is a very interesting opportunity to take a high-end restaurant inspired approach to everyday vegan and vegetarian meals, because most people don’t know how to cook this so it tastes absolutely amazing.

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