Cultured Cat Food
When she was in her teens, Shannon Falconer decided to stop eating animals for welfare reasons. Now, the former Stanford microbiologist has found an opportunity to use her scientific training to take animals out of the supply chain altogether, focusing on the cultivation of meat for pets through her startup Because, Animals. In this week’s episode we chat further with Shannon about the impact of the pet food industry and why it’s an important sector to tackle. We discuss the startup’s approach to product development, how they’ve gone about developing serum-free media, plus more.
Shannon Falconer has a deep love for animals. Having grown up with 3 dogs and 3 cats, despite working full-time as a scientist she would spend her evenings doing volunteer work at a cat shelter.
It was during her time doing research during the day that she realised she could use her scientific training to find a way to take animals out of the supply chain, a realisation that caused her to quit her post-doc and embark on the journey of entrepreneurship through the founding of Because, Animals.
Shannon: “I didn’t ever see there being an opportunity for these worlds to collide.”
But how did she land on the idea of cultivated meat? And what about the idea for pet food?
Shannon: “I realised that food was something I could apply my training to; of course at first I thought I would apply this training to taking animals out of the supply chain with respect to food focused on food for humans, because of course humans are the main consumers of animal-based products. But as I thought about this more I began to question this…”
Shannon: “When it came to feeding my pets I had virtually no options to choose from, so I was forced to support the animal agriculture industry.”
At first Shannon mentions that she had doubts about whether or not the pet food industry actually had a big impact on animal agriculture, however as she did more research it became clear that animal agriculture relies so heavily on the sector, that in its absence it would cease to exist in the form that we currently know it.
Shannon: “About 50% of an animal is comprised of body parts that people don’t want to eat. This includes heads, bones, blood, viscera… so all of this is sold to pet food. There’s also fallen animals, livestock that die before making it to slaughter.”
Combined with what are termed 4-D animals (dead, dying, diseased or disabled), the contaminated flesh is then sent to a rendering facility where a high amount of heat is applied to sterilise it before it is sold to the pet food industry. Altogether this adds up to 25 million tonnes annually in the US and Canada alone, and carries a value of > $4.6 billion USD / year.
Shannon: “With that realisation I decided that absolutely, pet food was what we needed to focus on.”
Once the idea was there, it then came down to creating a product. At first, Shannon and her co-founder Joshua Errett considered producing something from an alternative protein source, with the pair only deciding to double-down on cultured meat in 2018. The decision was sparked predominantly by the fact that cats are obligatory carnivores, meaning that they need to consume other animals in order to obtain all of their nutrients, unlike dogs who are more similar to humans in terms of their metabolic requirements.
Shannon: “We had always thought about it, but it wasn’t a priority.”
That same year the pair launched probiotic-based supplements, one for cats and another for dogs, with a nutritional yeast-based line of dog cookies being released in 2020.
The reason behind launching with these products first, Shannon says, is due to the fact that Because, Animals wanted to build a brand using cultured ingredients that people already know and recognise the health benefits of, both for themselves and their pets.
Shannon: “Of course probiotics are grown in a bioreactor, nutritional yeast is grown in a bioreactor, and cultured meat is grown in a bioreactor.”
Shannon: “We thought as we’re building this brand … we [want] take people, consumers, along the journey of creating it, and make sure that they’re really familiar with it.”
The first cultivated meat product to launch are the Harmless Hunt: Mouse Cookies for Cats. The reason for starting with treats versus nutritionally complete food?
Shannon: “We don’t need meat to be the first ingredient. So one of the bottlenecks for Because, Animals and certainly all cultured meat companies, is this scaling piece. The infrastructure to actually create as much meat as we need in order to fill demand, we’re still working on actually building that infrastructure, as everybody is.”
Shannon: “In making a treat, we’re including a smaller amount of cultured meat as it’s not necessary for the animal… and then we’re using in addition to the cultured mouse, other plant-based products as well as other cultured products. We have some miso in there, some nutritional yeast again, pumpkin.”
Part of the reason is also due to the fact that people may need some time to become familiar with, and trust the product. Starting with a lower amount of meat (10%) enables them to do this; to ease the customer into the experience.
Shannon: “We do believe people might just want to dip their toe in before they actually switch their pet’s full diet.”
Image: Because, Animals’ Harmless Hunt Mouse Cookies for Cats.
Aside from the scaling, Because, Animals like other cultured meat companies, also faced the hurdle of FBS and producing a serum-free media to grow their animal cells in.
The journey for Shannon and Joshua started in 2019 when they began looking at how they could replace, or entirely omit FBS and any other animal ingredients from the media. Luckily Shannon’s background prepared her for the challenge.
Shannon: “My training is in microbiology, but specifically chemical genetics. So basically the centre of my training has been about understanding, mechanistically, what different components, chemicals or molecules, in any kind of system, what these are doing, what their functions are within a cell”
Shannon: “Whether that’s an animal or microbial cell, it doesn’t really matter mechanistically… all of our cells are run by molecules.”
Having that foundational mechanistic understanding is what enables Shannon to have the ability to see whether there are better alternatives that can perform the same functional.
Shannon: “Using that mindset we were able to pretty quickly tackle the formulation of our media, and take FBS out.”
Shannon: “In doing so we were also able to reduce the cost of our media by an order of magnitude, and now we’re continuing to optimise it … but we’re pretty close to being final.”
And the functionality?
Shannon: “We see the same amount of growth of our cells, with or without FBS, so we know that functionally the media is absolutely serving the purpose.”
Shannon also spoke about optimising existing bioreactors and the increasing interest of companies in investing and supporting the growth of this industry.
Shannon: “They understand they can be big, pivotal players in moving things forward, in a way we couldn’t do otherwise.”
Because, Animals also had the chance to try out their products and garner consumer attention at the SuperZoo trade show.
Shannon: “While we were there, the real challenge was generating the attention and interest of other people that were there.”
Shannon: “We were so thrilled with the turnout; people are genuinely extremely interested in what we’re doing. We’ve spoken with a lot of big, medium and smaller-sized players now too, who are very very interested in what a potential partnership could look like because as I mentioned, we are the only ones doing cultured meat for pet food right now.”
Although the interest of the pet industry may come as a shock, Shannon says it’s explanatory based on where consumer wants are heading.
Shannon: “The other industry leaders recognise that people want an alternative, they want a better option for feeding their pets, and animal-based meat for a lot of people is a real challenge … the only reason why they feed them it is because it’s the only option. But as soon as there’s another option for meat, that does not require the raising and slaughtering of an animal, they understand that absolutely, the trends are going in that direction.”
In order to demonstrate the extent of this support, Shannon spoke about their pre-order list, a list which exists to show just how large the promise is for the product.
Shannon: “That pre-order list is just there to demonstrate that incredible demand, so that we can raise our next round of funding and then scale this product and bring it to market.”
Because, Animals’ plan is to launch the cell-cultured meat cookies within the next 6 months. Although Shannon mentioned the startup is working on achieving regulatory approval within the US, the product will be launched in another country.
Shannon: “Our vision is simple .. it is to take animals out of the supply chain, and as much as we can facilitate that, we will.”
To learn more or stay updated with Because, Animals you can head to their website or follow them on social media.