Burgs Foods, a young Dutch insect-based food producer, has raised funding from early-stage venture capitalist Unknown Group. The funding is to aid Burgs Foods in its goal for every European to eat at least one meal per week made of insect meat by 2030.
Under the established brand, De Krekerij, Burgs Foods, a StartLife startup alumnus, has rapidly grown to the role of pioneer of the Dutch market in the domain of cricket and grasshopper-made alternative meat products. Last summer their mini sausage rolls filled with crickets were shining on the shelves in all Lidl stores in the Netherlands,
and co-founder Sander Peltenburg was named into the prestigious Dutch Food100 list of entrepreneurs changing the food landscape.
Cricket to Ride
The products of Burgs Foods, which include traditional burgers, meatballs and sausage rolls, along with new classics like pulled grasshopper are characterized by three core features:
- a unique umami flavor,
- nutrient-rich in nature, and
- sustainable.
With these product features Burgs Foods is riding the wave called ‘alternative protein foods’, or should we say, playing the food game ‘cricket to ride’, a movement in line with the sustainable development goals of the United Nations, aimed at feeding the world with improved nutrition that are sustainably produced. Indeed, Burgs Foods’ products lead to significantly less environmental impact and greater resource efficiency in consuming insects as compared to livestock.
The Unknown
Edward de Jager, Chairman of Unknown Group said: ”We have known Sander Peltenburg and George Brandenburg, the co-founders of Burgs Foods, for a long time already and consider them strong and dynamic founders. Furthermore, their changemaking contribution to the future of the food industry is driven by sustainable motivation. We see enormous potential in this industry and these founders, and that’s why we welcome them to venture into the Unknown and beyond.”
Sanders mentions that the investment from Unknown Group will be used to strategically and sustainably grow their business by increasing their processing capacity, building partnerships to bring their products to market and marketing their products. On immediate goals, he adds: “We want to raise the level of our production facility to the highest possible safety standards – FSSC 22000. When we reach this, we are able to produce our products under white label for the professional food market throughout Europe. This brings our products to shelves and menus around the continent!”
Big & Hairy
Burgs Foods goals can be called Big and Hairy, which does not refer to the size and skin of their food ingredients, but to their big hairy audacious goal of having every European eat, or should we say try, at least one insect-based meat meal per week by 2030. With their unique insect processing technologies they intend to become the food factory of the future for everything related to processing insects into food. We look forward to Burgs Foods making its ‘big whopper’ up next.