Countless Meals Co has raised €1 million in pre-seed funding to advance its progressive chocolate various, THIC (This Isn’t Chocolate), geared toward tackling sustainability and provide chain points within the chocolate business.
The funding spherical was led by Nordic Foodtech VC, with participation from EIFO and Rockstart, and can allow the corporate to scale manufacturing, set up a pilot plant, and increase its group.
Countless Meals Co’s THIC is comprised of ‘upcycled’ brewer’s spent grain, a main byproduct of beer brewing, and serves as a sustainable, cost-effective various to conventional chocolate. In contrast to cacao, which faces rising provide challenges resulting from local weather change, THIC is positioned as a scalable resolution that reduces reliance on cacao and addresses environmental and moral issues within the chocolate business.
”Our core mission is to supply a scrumptious, long-term, and price-friendly resolution for the present chocolate and meals industries. Hopefully someday, we may also help coat each Mars bar with our various chocolate resolution,” says Maximillian Bogenmann, Co-founder and CEO of Countless Meals Co. “Till then, providing a flavour-first, sustainable various to chocolate on a big scale presents an enormous alternative to positively impression our present meals system. Partnering with a forward-thinking retailer like 7-Eleven provides us a tremendous first step towards realising the Countless imaginative and prescient.”
Based in 2022 by Maximillian Bogenmann, Christian Bach, and Matt Orlando, Countless Meals Co leverages its founders’ culinary experience from eating places corresponding to Noma and The Fats Duck. The corporate’s method to scalable upcycling options highlights how sustainability and indulgence can probably coexist, providing an answer to chocolate’s mounting challenges.
Countless Meals Co has additionally introduced a key business partnership with 7-Eleven Denmark to carry its product to market. The collaboration will initially characteristic a sequence of THIC-based merchandise, together with a co-branded cookie with TIM’s Cookies, accessible in all 180 Danish 7-Eleven places by the tip of the yr.
Jesper Østergaard, CEO of 7-Eleven Denmark, expressed enthusiasm for the partnership: “7 – Eleven is consistently exploring new alternatives and difficult the standard method of doing issues. In our eyes, THIC is a very thrilling product as a result of it’s a extra sustainable various to chocolate – with out compromising on nice style. We’re excited to supply our prospects THIC in our cookies as early as subsequent month – and with out giving all of it away , I’m fairly certain they’ll look ahead to extra of this type in our shops sooner or later.”
In keeping with Countless Meals Co, the standard chocolate business is below stress, with cacao costs greater than doubling over the previous yr resulting from climate-induced disruptions within the world provide chain. Moreover, the sector faces important moral and environmental points, together with deforestation, biodiversity loss, and labour exploitation.
THIC supplies a possible resolution, providing the identical style and texture as conventional chocolate however with as much as 80-90% decrease carbon emissions, in response to a latest life cycle evaluation.
“Countless Meals Co is a superb wager within the various cacao area. Their substances playbook aligns superbly with our technique round backing founders fixing the deep underlying issues in our world meals system: Cacao is a local weather – threatened crop that may develop into dearer as provide turns into scarcer and demand continues to extend,” says Louise Rørbæk Heiberg from Nordic Foodtech VC. “We’re proud to help this high-powered and impactful group of their journey as they develop and increase, beginning wi th this key partnership with 7-Eleven. And let’s be clear , they’ve nailed the style and high quality from the start.”
