Plant-Based Meat Has a Product Problem, Not Just a Marketing Problem - Study

New Australian research suggests better advertising won't necessarily persuade meat eaters, the category first has to deliver convincingly on taste, quality and value.

The plant-based meat industry may have spent too much time trying to find the right message when the bigger challenge is the product proposition itself.

The research from Adelaide University has found that Australian meat eaters perceive plant-based meat as riskier and offering less value than conventional meat, with those perceptions significantly influencing willingness to buy or recommend the products. Published in the Journal of Marketing Management, the research involved 990 Australian consumers and examined how perceived risk, value and different advertising approaches influenced acceptance of plant-based meat.

Lead researcher Cassidy Shaw and colleagues tested whether changing the advertising proposition could shift those attitudes. Emotional messages built around enjoyment and rational messages emphasising attributes such as health produced surprisingly limited movement among meat eaters. Existing perceptions surrounding value and risk remained more powerful than the style of advertising used. Younger consumers presented an especially interesting result: emotional messaging could actually reduce perceptions of product quality.

Rational messaging, by contrast, improved quality perceptions among vegetarian consumers.

The findings help explain a contradiction that has followed Australia's plant-based meat sector. The category has established meaningful commercial scale with Australian sales reached A$272.5 million in FY2023, 47% higher than in 2020, but retail growth has been much harder to sustain. Retail sales essentially contracted slightly over that period while foodservice expanded strongly. It also identified two familiar obstacles: some products were not meeting consumer expectations around taste, while higher prices relative to conventional meat discouraged repeat purchasing.

That suggests the next stage of plant-based meat may depend less upon convincing consumers why they should eat it and more upon eliminating the compromises they believe they are being asked to make. For manufacturers, the message emerging from Adelaide is relatively straightforward: taste first, texture second, price close behind and marketing can then amplify a proposition consumers already believe.

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