SINGAPORE — Home chefs will now be able to cook their own versions of plant-based Impossible meat dishes, as the company is selling its “beef” at about 79 NTUC FairPrice stores and online grocer RedMart, in a quick pivot to retail amid the impact of Covid-19.

The product will be rolled out to about 100 FairPrice outlets in the coming weeks.

The United States-based company Impossible Foods has previously focused its efforts on supplying its plant-based meat products to restaurants but said in a media briefing on Tuesday (Oct 20) that as the pandemic hit the food and beverage industry, it had to accelerate its plans to expand into retail sales.

And so this week it will begin selling Impossible Beef in supermarkets in Singapore and Hong Kong, Impossible Foods founder and chief executive Patrick O Brown said.

In Singapore, a 340g pack of the product is priced at S$16.90.

“One of the hardest hit sectors of the economy was restaurants and pretty much the restaurant business still hasn't recovered from the pandemic,” Dr Brown said.

“So we had to pivot very quickly to accelerate our launch in retail so that consumers would have access to the product when it was not available in restaurants and you know that's been very, very successful.”

Impossible meat is now served in 550 restaurants in Singapore, up 120 per cent from last year. They feature in dishes such as Impossible satay, Impossible chilli fries and Impossible dim sum.

Singapore and Hong Kong are the first markets outside of the US where Impossible products are being sold directly to consumers. The products are now sold in more than 11,000 retail outlets across the US, Hong Kong and Singapore, an increase of 77 times since March this year.

When asked about upcoming plans, Mr Nick Halla, the senior vice president for international of Impossible Foods said that in January this year, the company previewed Impossible Pork at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in January.

"China's a huge focus, it is approximately 27 per cent of global meat consumption,” he said.

“We’re looking pretty broadly through Asia. Our goal is to be everywhere where meat, fish and dairy foods are consumed and deliver consumers a better option, more delicious, more nutritious, much more sustainable and as we continue to scale more affordable over time.”

Also present at the briefing was Mr Richard Ruddy, the chief retail officer and head of grocery at Lazada Singapore, which owns RedMart.

He said RedMart has seen “tremendous growth” this year in the number of customer searches for plant based-products. 

“And that's translated into sales across plant-based products in a number of different categories, meats and meat alternatives being one of them in particular. In fact, Impossible has been one of the top search terms on our platform in the last 12 months since the launch in F&B outlets,” he said.