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When it debuted in the early 2010s, Beyond Meat made a giant splash with a novel idea: using technology to mimic animal proteins so closely that they wouldn't just appeal to vegetarians who had long sought out tempeh burgers and tofu sausages, but to fast-food-eating meat lovers, too.
After early excitement surrounding the company, its fortunes have declined in the last few years amid a politically charged embrace of red-blooded carnivorism and a social-media-fueled suspicion of processed foods.
Beyond's response? Seek out smoother waters — literally. The company, which this spring changed its name to Beyond The Plant Protein Co., or simply Beyond on its packaging, is preparing for the wider launch of Beyond Immerse, a fizzy, fruit-flavored drink that contains protein, fiber, vitamin C and electrolytes.
CEO Ethan Brown says the move was aimed at skirting the "culture wars" that have stymied meat alternatives.
Plant-based products, he said in an interview, are still the company's business.
"But the format we're delivering them in right now is this very politicized, culturally charged center-of-the-plate offering," he said, "so what if we took that technology and brand and started putting it in these adjacencies?"
The drink is just the first alternative-meat product that Beyond will launch, Brown said in an interview with The Post, though he would not share details about what other categories the brand might enter. The protein beverages will be sold in New York starting this summer, distributed by Big Geyser, the company that also places brands including Celsius and Poppi in stores.
With America's obsession with all things protein still going strong, many well-known brands have jumped into the protein drinks pool. Some were already known for beverages, including Starbucks, which this month introduced a ready-to-drink, protein-laced coffee after adding a wider selection to its menu in 2025. Dunkin', too, got on board with a slate of protein-forward sips earlier this year.
Popular tea maker Tazo last week debuted a lineup of protein-packed chai and matcha latte powders.
But it's less common for a company that specializes in plant-based burgers and nuggets to pivot to hawking bubbles. Still, Beyond isn't the only plant-based food company that has been forced to adapt to a shifting market.
Rival alt-meat maker Impossible Foods is also venturing from its core business into a line of protein-packed breads and pastas.
Beyond, which once symbolized the future of food, is now fighting for survival. After peaking near $235 a share in 2019, its stock now trades below $1.
The company made an early splash, particularly with its Beyond Burger. Its use of pea protein, beet juice for color, and coconut oil offered a closer dupe for beef than traditional vegetarian and vegan substitutes, and celebrity investors included Leonardo DiCaprio and Snoop Dogg.
By 2010, the company had made its way to the highest temples of American meat-eating: fast food. Beyond partnered with McDonald's on a McPlant sandwich, Pizza Hut on a pepperoni alternative and KFC on fried "chicken."
Beyond went public in 2019 in one of the hottest IPOs of the decade. But none of the fast food forays became permanent menu items, and the company's struggles continued as grocers moved its products from meat cases to freezer aisles.
What happened to the momentum behind plant-based meats?
David Just, a Cornell professor who studies food and consumer psychology, says part of the reason is cultural.
The shift in zeitgeist to strength-obsessed influencers — from gym bros to weighted-vest-wearing moms — has been rapid. Those voices, Just says, don't see plants as a way of packing on muscles.
"Much of the politics around food, around freedom with regard to food, just sort of flipped on its head in the last eight years," he says.
This is playing out against the backdrop of the Make America Healthy Again movement, headed by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has boasted of consuming steak twice a day and oversaw the reconfiguring of the new dietary guidelines pyramid to place red meat at the pinnacle.
A central tenet of the movement is a rejection of processed food and anything that seems too "food-science-y" — a position shared by plenty of natural food acolytes who otherwise have little in common politically with it.
Beyond, at least in its early years, boasted of its high-tech origins and cutting-edge innovations. Brown has acknowledged that alt-meats have lost the thread and says Beyond was in part a victim of the initial excitement around it. "The success of the movement created a counter-energy that was so strong it just flipped it all the way back," he said.
Brown also blames efforts by the beef and poultry industries to quash the burgeoning plant-based meats category, pointing to a 2020 campaign, including a Super Bowl ad poking fun at "synthetic meat" that was paid for by a Washington-based consumer group whose donors were not disclosed.
Some industry groups have pressed for legislation and regulation that would require companies like Beyond to include descriptors on labels, such as "imitation" or "cell-cultivated."
"All we're trying to do is make sure that those labeling standards are fair and cut evenly and fairly across the protein space," says Sigrid Johannes, the senior director of government affairs for the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, which has championed such efforts. "After that, we will compete with their retail case, just like we do every other form of protein today."
But in the end, Johannes, who said she was not familiar with the ad campaign Brown cited, doesn't think that Beyond's challenges have anything to do with consumers being influenced, but rather to increased aversion to processed foods.
"Their biggest problem is their own product and their own science," she says.
Brown acknowledges that the narrative about Beyond's products wasn't the company's only challenge, but he says it "did so much to reduce availability."
Experts say that alt-meats could eventually become more mainstream if U.S. food culture shifts again, or if they become less-expensive options, as meat prices — particularly for beef — continue to rise.
For now, drinks and other categories still look like a surer bet to Brown.
All of Beyond's future products, he says, will have good macronutrient ratios ("protein and fiber content to calorie content"), be made with "clean" ingredients, and have relatively limited ingredients. "If we can get that trifecta right, we're going to win in the category and provide a good price," he says.
And while the protein-drink market might already be crowded, Brown said he hopes Beyond Immerse's lighter profile will help it stand out in a sea of dairy.
Brandon McFaddon, a professor at the University of Arkansas who studies agricultural economics, says Beyond's move to a beverage focus seems like a smart one, given the seemingly unending appetite for protein products and the diminished enthusiasm around meat alternatives. But he isn't sure that potential fans of the drinks will be lured into trying Beyond's core products, if they haven't already, or to look at them with fresh eyes.
"All the problems still remain," he says. "So whether or not someone's drinking up the protein water, it doesn't change the fact that ground beef is still available, which is generally lower price, better tasting, and unless somebody's got a strong individual reason, whether it be environmental or animal welfare, then you know it's going to lose out continuously."
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