Mission
The Hungry Badger is a meal kit service that offers the convenience of
delivering weekly menus and groceries with which to make each meal in a single
serving size. Consequently, our main objective is to provide fresh, organic
ingredients and recipes to prepare meals in the right proportions specifically for
single adults.
The Company and Management
The Hungry Badger is headquartered in Columbus,
Ohio. The company is owned by partners Tyra Cooper, Lauren Edwards, and Kelly
Bivens. Tyra has over 10 years of experience in e-commerce. Lauren is a marketing
professional and health and fitness enthusiast and Kelly is the Executive Chef at
Cameron Mitchell restaurants.
All partners will be taking hands-on management
roles in the company. In addition, we have assembled a board of advisors to
provide management and financial expertise. The advisors are:
- Peter Conway, president of Conway Communications
- Christine Taragano, partner at Taragano Accounting
- Allison Peters, owner of North Stare Café, organic and vegetarian restaurant chain
Services
The Hungry Badger offers busy single adults who love to cook or are interested in learning, but do not have time to prepare healthy meals for dinner. Each meal kit contains single-portioned, pre-measured organic ingredients sourced from local farmers and growers, including fruits, vegetables and meats. Chef-crafted sauces are also included in each meal kit.
Recipes are quick and easy, with step-by-step instructions, chef’s tips and full color recipe cards. Delivery options include weekly, bi-weekly, and monthly. Subscribers can create an online account to store their favorite recipes and update their preferences, including subscription plan.
The Market
According to Technomic, a food-industry consulting firm, the meal-kit service segment of the market will grow to between $3 billion - $5 billion over the next 10 years based on current adoption rates. Since boxed-meal startups Blue Apron and Plated launched in 2012, they have raised $58 million and $21.6 million, respectively; the Wall Street Journal recently reported that Blue Apron is in talks to raise a huge new round from investors that would value the company at $2 billion [Segran, 2015].
However, the article, Why is Blue Apron single-shaming me?, states that “Meal kits like Blue Apron and others are biased against single people: They encourage us to sit down … across from no one. They leave us with enough food for multiple people, so we will be eating the same meal for days.”
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, single people now outnumber married adults in the U.S. One in 7 lives alone – about 31 million compared with 4 million in 1950 – and many of those are clustered in urban centers. Meanwhile, only 30 percent of Millennials say that having a successful marriage is “one of the most important things” in life, according to the Pew Research Center, down from even the 47 percent of Generation X who said the same thing in 1997. Four in 10 Americans went ever further, telling Pew researchers in 2010 that marriage was becoming obsolete [Hanes, 2015].
Timeline
Start-up Financing Requirements
The Market
In the United States, the meal kit business has
been booming primarily adopted by millennial urbanites. “These are people with
more expendable income who are looking for convenience and perhaps do not know
how to cook on their own,” says Brian Todd, president of the food intelligence
nonprofit, The Food Institute.
According to Technomic, a food-industry consulting firm, the meal-kit service segment of the market will grow to between $3 billion - $5 billion over the next 10 years based on current adoption rates. Since boxed-meal startups Blue Apron and Plated launched in 2012, they have raised $58 million and $21.6 million, respectively; the Wall Street Journal recently reported that Blue Apron is in talks to raise a huge new round from investors that would value the company at $2 billion [Segran, 2015].
However, the article, Why is Blue Apron single-shaming me?, states that “Meal kits like Blue Apron and others are biased against single people: They encourage us to sit down … across from no one. They leave us with enough food for multiple people, so we will be eating the same meal for days.”
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, single people now outnumber married adults in the U.S. One in 7 lives alone – about 31 million compared with 4 million in 1950 – and many of those are clustered in urban centers. Meanwhile, only 30 percent of Millennials say that having a successful marriage is “one of the most important things” in life, according to the Pew Research Center, down from even the 47 percent of Generation X who said the same thing in 1997. Four in 10 Americans went ever further, telling Pew researchers in 2010 that marriage was becoming obsolete [Hanes, 2015].
With this information, the Hungry Badger is
capitalizing on a growing business model and an underserved demographic.
Competitive Advantage
- Unlike Blue Apron, Plated or Green Chef, our service offers pre-portioned meals specifically for single adults.
- We partner with farmers to source sustainable, non-GMO ingredients.
- Each meal kit is packed with fresh, organic fruits, vegetables and meats.
- Each recipe is crafted by expert chefs.
- Subscribers can substitute meals that they know they will not like.
- Subscribers can post video recordings of themselves preparing a Hungry Badger recipe to receive $15 toward future deliveries.
Timeline
Our business timeline is as follows:
- July – September: 3 months
- Complete product development
- September – December: 4
months
- Hire marketing agency
- Develop marketing plan
- January – February: 2 months
- Launch into test market
- March: 1 month
- Fine-tune product and
marketing
- April 2018
- Launch nationwide
Start-up Financing Requirements
We are seeking an operating line of $250,000 to finance our first-year
growth. Together, the co-owners have invested $150,000 to meet working capital
requirements.
Sources
Cohn, A. (2016). Why is Blue Apron single-shaming me? Meal kits don’t work for solo chefs. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/news/soloish/wp/2016/11/01/why-is-blue-apron-single-shaming-me-meal-kits-dont-work-for-solo-chefs/
Hanes, S. (2015). Singles nation: Why so many Americans are unmarried. Retrieved from https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2015/0614/Singles-nation-Why-so-many-Americans-are-unmarried
Cohn, A. (2016). Why is Blue Apron single-shaming me? Meal kits don’t work for solo chefs. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/news/soloish/wp/2016/11/01/why-is-blue-apron-single-shaming-me-meal-kits-dont-work-for-solo-chefs/
Hanes, S. (2015). Singles nation: Why so many Americans are unmarried. Retrieved from https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2015/0614/Singles-nation-Why-so-many-Americans-are-unmarried
Segran, E. (2015). The $5 Million Battle for the
American Dinner Plate. Retrieved from https://www.fastcompany.com/3046685/most-creative-people/the-5-billion-battle-for-the-american-dinner-plate
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