In recent years, we have witnessed the growth of a food category that presents itself as an alternative to animal proteins: the plant-based world.
It is a legitimate phenomenon, destined to find its place in the market and to attract consumers who, for different reasons, wish to orient their choices toward plant-derived products.
However, the point I would like to observe and encourage reflection upon is a different one.
Consumers’ freedom of choice deserves respect, just as companies deserve the freedom to invest in new market segments when they believe there are economic opportunities and prospects for growth. Yet, when looking at some of the strategies adopted in recent years, a reflection emerges that goes beyond the commercial dimension.
A reflection that concerns communication, reputation, and perhaps even identity itself.
For decades, many companies have built their credibility around animal-derived products. They have invested in innovation, food safety, animal welfare, sustainability, nutritional research, and product quality. They have communicated to consumers the value of what they produce. They have explained why certain supply chains deserve trust. They have defended the nutritional role of animal proteins within a balanced diet.
Today, some of those same companies are choosing to complement their traditional products with food lines designed for consumers who wish to reduce or replace their intake of animal proteins. This is a perfectly understandable business decision, but it is also a choice that inevitably raises important questions.
When a company builds part of its growth on the production of meat or eggs and subsequently invests in promoting products that the market perceives as alternatives to those same categories, what message reaches the consumer?
Is the strategy interpreted as simple diversification? Or does it risk being perceived as an implicit doubt regarding the company’s own historical narrative?
Naturally, this is not the intention of those companies. On the contrary, in most cases the objective is probably to serve different markets, broaden the offering, and respond to evolving consumer demand.
However, communication does not live solely through the intentions of those who produce it. It lives above all through the perceptions of those who receive it. And this is where the issue becomes particularly interesting.
Over recent years, the animal protein sectors, and the poultry sector in particular, have been called upon to address recurring criticisms. Criticisms concerning farming practices, sustainability, animal welfare, environmental impact, and even the very legitimacy of consuming foods of animal origin.
Criticisms that deserve consideration when they are well founded and deserve appropriate responses when they are based on simplifications or generalizations.
For this very reason, it becomes crucial to reflect on how reputation is built and protected.
Reputation is not strengthened solely by responding to external criticism. It is also strengthened by maintaining a clear conviction in the value of what one does. And this leads to a question that deserves to be asked without prejudice.
If a sector truly believes that its production systems are compatible with society’s expectations regarding sustainability, food safety, nutritional balance, and affordability, to what extent does it make sense to embrace narratives that may be perceived as legitimizing the very criticisms it receives?
There is no single answer. Perhaps the strategy is correct. Perhaps it is inevitable. Perhaps it simply represents the natural evolution of increasingly fragmented markets.
Nevertheless, it is worth reflecting on the cultural and communicative consequences of these choices, because when an alternative enters a company’s product portfolio, it inevitably enters its narrative as well. And every narrative, before influencing the market, contributes to shaping how people interpret reality.
The real challenge for the animal protein sector is not to demonstrate that it can do something else. Rather, it is to continue explaining clearly why what it has always done still retains value, dignity, and valid reasons to be chosen by consumers today.
Not against something. Not in opposition to someone. But simply for what it is.
There is one final aspect that deserves attention.
Companies are understandably required to evaluate economic opportunities, consumer trends, and growth prospects. That is their role, and diversification decisions often stem from perfectly rational business considerations.
For this reason, it can sometimes be useful to complement market analysis with a broader reflection on the reputational implications of business decisions, because every new product generates revenue, but it also generates meaning.
Every new strategic choice expands a commercial portfolio, yet at the same time contributes to reshaping the company’s perceived identity. And what appears coherent in spreadsheets does not always generate the same coherence in the eyes of consumers.
The role of those who observe these phenomena from the outside is not to tell companies what they should or should not produce. Rather, it is to help understand the implicit messages that may accompany certain decisions.
I say this because companies are not judged solely for what they sell. Increasingly, they are judged for what they appear to be saying through what they sell.
And it is precisely within that subtle yet decisive space that the real battle for reputation is often won or lost.
Pietro Greppi – Ethical Communication & Poultry Industry Strategy
