Business Wars: Beyond Meat vs. Impossible Burger | Beefing Up, Chowing Down (Episode 3)

Original Air Date: January 7, 2026
Host: David Brown
Podcast by: Wondery

Episode Overview

This episode continues the high-stakes rivalry between plant-based meat titans Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat, exploring their head-to-head battles for dominance in grocery aisles, fast food chains, and the American imagination. The episode chronicles their meteoric rises, the regulatory and PR challenges each faces, the remarkable demand for their products, and the internal and external pressures that shape their future. Bold ambitions, business clashes, culture war skirmishes, and the realities of consumer preference drive this rich, dramatic episode.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Tensions at Impossible Foods: Culture Clash Meets Ambition

• Scene: 2019, Impossible Foods HQ, Redwood City, CA
• Pat Brown, founder of Impossible Foods, clashes with President Dennis Woodside over management versus innovation.
  • Pat is dismissive of office politics and is singularly focused on scaling production and disrupting the meat industry.
  • Memorable line:

    "We're on a mission to push the beef industry into a death spiral. And after we do that, we'll tell pork and chicken they're next."
    – Pat Brown (02:32)

  • Pat sets an audacious growth target: double production every year for 15 years, scaling "30,000 fold".

2. Competitive Positioning: Beyond Meat vs. Impossible's Ingredients

• Scene: Beyond Meat test kitchen, El Segundo, CA with CEO Ethan Brown and journalist Tad Friend
• Key Differences in Burger Recipes:
  • Beyond Meat uses pea protein, mung beans, brown rice, coconut oil – no soy.
  • Impossible uses genetically modified soy and heme, which they bill as the "magic ingredient".
  • Debate over the role and perception of genetically modified ingredients.
    • Ethan is skeptical about heme’s role and critical of “magic” branding.

    "There's nothing magic about it. Our scientists have studied heme. We don't think it makes their burgers taste like beef. In fact, we don't think it provides any flavor at all."
    – Ethan Brown (06:36)

  • Beyond Meat chooses non-GMO, criticizing consumer wariness about soy and GMOs.

3. Impossible Burger’s Explosive Retail Launch

• Scene: Gelson’s Grocery, Encino, CA (Sept 2019)
  • Immediate, overwhelming demand for Impossible Burger in grocery stores; “biggest product launch we’ve ever had.”
  • Customers willing to pay a premium (Impossible: $9/package vs. ground beef: $3/package) simply for at-home experience.
  • Rapid sellouts mirrored across other chains like Wegmans.

4. The Beef Industry Strikes Back: PR & Advertising Battles

• Scene: Impossible Foods HQ
  • Rachel Conrad (PR chief) alerts Pat Brown to negative press driven by beef lobby groups, particularly the Center for Consumer Freedom.
  • They are characterized as a shadowy group defending "every evil industry you can think of" (12:27).
  • Ad war escalates:
    • Super Bowl 2020: Center for Consumer Freedom runs a local ad panning plant-based products as "chemicals", featuring a fake spelling bee ridiculing ingredient names.

      “You might need a PhD to understand what’s in synthetic meat. Fake bacon and burgers can have dozens of chemical ingredients. If you can’t spell it or pronounce it, maybe you shouldn’t be eating it.”
      – Super Bowl Ad (14:56)

    • Impossible Foods Fires Back: Pat Brown hosts their own ad, spelling "poop" to underscore contamination risks in animal meat – an irreverent but pointed response.

      "Just because a kid can spell poop doesn’t mean you or your kids should be eating it."
      – Impossible Foods ad (16:32)

5. Beyond Meat Bets Big: Expansion, Financial Risks, and Partnerships

• Scene: Beyond Meat new headquarters plans (2021)
  • Ethan Brown plans a new state-of-the-art HQ, emphasizing R&D, AI, and a massive interior plant wall.
  • Pushes for over-investment to achieve scale, despite warnings from finance team about mounting losses and debt:

    "The only way to achieve a big goal like that is to turn ourselves into a bigger company. That means I'm going to over invest in research and development... I'm not going to lose sleep over a $150 million lease."
    – Ethan Brown (19:01)

  • Landmark partnerships inked with Yum! Brands (KFC, Pizza Hut) and a cautiously optimistic, limited test with McDonald's (the "McPlant").

6. Rising Headwinds: Consumer Health Concerns and Disillusionment

• Scene: 2021, consumer Michelle Darby in New Jersey
  • Darby, seeking to improve her health, switches to plant-based meats during the pandemic.
  • Doctor points out high sodium/processed nature of some plant-based products:

    "Michelle, no wonder you've not seen any changes. You've been eating processed food."
    – Doctor (26:19)

  • Realization that plant-based meats can sometimes be comparably processed and salty as regular meats prompts her to return to animal products.
  • This reflects a broader consumer concern leading to flagging sales.

7. Internal Struggles and Leadership Criticisms at Beyond Meat

• Scene: 2022, Beyond Meat’s unfinished new headquarters
  • Ethan Brown pushes for radical innovation; urges team to “have a disregard for our current products.”
  • Tension between business growth and scalable, high-quality product development.
    • Staff complain that Ethan pushes new products out before they're ready, causing supply chain and quality disasters.
    • “He sold [plant-based] beef jerky to PepsiCo before we had manufacturing capacity, so costs soared.”
    • “Breakfast sausages shrunk in the packaging; now our sales are shrinking.”
  • Frustration mounts; blame starts to focus squarely on Ethan Brown.

8. The Road Ahead: Celebrity Marketing Gambles & Uncertain Futures

• Plans for a new marketing campaign featuring Kim Kardashian alluded to, but initial results are ominous.
• Both companies face layoffs and strategic resets as consumer enthusiasm wanes and investors grow impatient.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Pat Brown (Impossible Foods founder) on their mission:

  "We're on a mission to push the beef industry into a death spiral." (02:32)

• Ethan Brown (Beyond Meat) on GMOs and soy:

  "Our customers don't want a lot of soy. They're worried about phytoestrogen. That's the stuff that can disrupt hormones and give you man boobs." (07:23)

• Bloomberg headline, via Rachel Conrad:

  "Critics Challenge Health Benefits of Faux Meat." (11:54)

• Center for Consumer Freedom’s Super Bowl Ad:

  "If you can't spell it or pronounce it, maybe you shouldn't be eating it." (15:03)

• Impossible Foods Response (Pat Brown):

  "The stinky brown stuff that comes out of your butt... there's poop in the ground beef we make from cows. Poop." (15:52)

• Michelle Darby's doctor on processed foods:

  "You've been eating processed food." (26:19)

• Ethan Brown on relentless innovation:

  "Our goal now, as always, is to have a disregard for our current products. We want to make the products that we already have on shelves obsolete." (28:30)

Key Timestamps

• 00:00-02:45: Impossible Foods’ internal management clash between Pat Brown and Dennis Woodside
• 05:18-08:12: Beyond Meat vs. Impossible product philosophy showdown (Ethan Brown and Tad Friend)
• 08:12-11:32: Impossible Burger’s retail launch, instant sell-outs, customer testimonials
• 11:32-13:07: Meat lobby fight escalates; Rachel Conrad investigates industry-funded PR attacks
• 14:39-16:38: Super Bowl ad war ("chemical" vs. "poop" campaigns)
• 17:41-19:39: Beyond Meat’s HQ expansion and financial risks
• 20:18-21:53: Landmark fast food deals - Yum! Brands and McDonald's
• 25:42-26:38: Consumer health questions and the challenge of “processed” plant-based foods
• 28:06-28:47: Beyond Meat’s internal dissent; innovation vs. execution problems
• 30:00-End: Set-up for next episode: Celebrities, layoffs, and the fading sizzle of plant-based hype

Tone & Flow

The episode balances narrative-driven storytelling with firsthand dramatizations, staying true to the high-stakes, occasionally irreverent tone of both the host and the industry players. Speakers are frank, competitive, combative, and—at times—humorously blunt, reflecting both the optimism and pitfalls that define disruptive startups.

Summary

In this episode, listeners get a front-row seat to the intense ambitions, business philosophies, and competitive jabs that shape the modern plant-based meat industry. Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat soar and stumble as they vie for supremacy, negotiate existential threats from the meat lobby, face internal and consumer-driven doubts, and try to keep pace with each other’s innovations. But as enthusiasm cools, both are forced to reckon with whether their products—and their leaders—can ultimately live up to their grand promises.