4 ms·

Personally speaking, I think the B2B market makes a lot of sense for Soylent. Especially sales to the military, space agencies, and maybe even white labeling fo

Personally speaking, I think the B2B market makes a lot of sense for Soylent. Especially sales to the military, space agencies, and maybe even white labeling for big food companies. In the consumer space, sure, you have some "Valley geeks" who see food as more of a burden to be solved than a source of enjoyment or socialization. But you've also got folks like athletes, both professional and amateur (a much bigger consumer market). If (and it's a big if) Soylent satisfies the requirements of a high-intensity training program, then it could take off there. People who are obsessed with performance nutrition tend to place less emphasis on food-as-experience and more emphasis on food as fuel. That's the Soylent psychographic sweet spot.

jw_ 13y ago
Military organizations already spend a lot of time and money on food, given its overwhelming importance in things like fighting wars. I suspect "Valley nerdchow-paste" is not going to do a lot to raise morale.
- jonnathanson 13y ago
  "Military organizations already spend a lot of time and money on food, given its overwhelming importance in things like fighting wars" Correct, which is why military branches are deep-pocketed potential buyers. "I suspect "Valley nerdchow-paste" is not going to do a lot to raise morale." In a military context it's not a meal replacement, per se. More of an emergency MRE or HDR replacement, provided it's more shelf stable and can compete on nutritional factors. (Big ifs, of course.) I don't disagree that morale is a concern, though. MREs are nasty, but they're at least attempting to be palatable within the confines of their purpose.
- microtherion 13y ago
  Indeed. Military organizations have learned over several millennia that serving unappealing food to heavily armed and lethally trained people is bound to lead to suboptimal outcomes.
segmondy 13y ago
You are counting out lazy people. There are lots of lazy people who find it even a burden to grocery shop, unpack and microwave food.
- kamaal 13y ago
  Jeez, where are we heading to? I would consider 'microwave food' as lazy. Food is the at most basic necessity of your body, with air, water, shelter and clothes. Are people really so busy that you can't get off your keyboard to eat something? I am not sure if that is the case merely using Soylent is going to fix any of your problems.
foobarqux 13y ago
Maybe they should be a Herbalife and do multi-level marketing.
dragonwriter 13y ago
> Personally speaking, I think the B2B market makes a lot of sense for Soylent. Especially sales to the military, space agencies, and maybe even white labeling for big food companies. Last I heard, the main focus of new food efforts for the military is long-shelf-life food that does a better job of emulating "normal" food. Because it makes a pretty big difference to morale. > In the consumer space, sure, you have some "Valley geeks" who see food as more of a burden to be solved than a source of enjoyment or socialization. But you've also got folks like athletes, both professional and amateur (a much bigger consumer market). A market that's highly saturated with well-established nutritional supplements and meal substitute powders, shakes, etc. The one space where Soylent has an advantage over established market players is in marketing to Valley geeks that are insulated from the other markets for this kind of product (some of which is of the "this product is a good fit for you" type, and some of which is "this product is a solution to all kinds of other things for which there are not currently solutions" type, but both of those are marketing messages for Soylent that are mostly successful with the same demographic.)
vidarh 13y ago
I love good food. But I fall in the amateur athlete category, and for me getting the right nutrition mix is a massive chore on a day to day basis. I would never go to just Soylent, but I'd love to experiment with substituting a number of meals with it.
- gotrecruit 13y ago
  as an amateur athlete, it's time you learn about sports supplements. if you had, you'll come to realize there are many meal replacement products that can easily satisfy your needs and that has been around for decades. EAS myoplex is the first that comes to mind that not only has a lot of important nutrients, but actually tastes pretty good in my opinion.
  - vidarh 13y ago
    The condescending tone is unwarranted and distasteful. Especially when you so totally miss the point of Soylent vs. sports supplements like Myoplex: The latter are not in any way trying to provide the same. They generally aim for roughly a certain mix of proteins, carbs and fats + various mixes of other ingredients that often seem to be chosen mostly to be buzzword complete. In fact, here's some sales copy regarding Myoplex: "EAS recommends supplementing your diet with 2-3 high quality Myoplex nutrition shakes along with 3-4 whole food meals a day to ensure that any nutritional "gaps" are filled. " I use a lot of supplements - for my protein intake I use or have used a variety of shakes, bars, muffins (yes...), cookies, to complement my high protein "real foods". To date I have never found a sports supplement that tastes nice without being way too high calorie for my use, but I can tolerate that for the convenience. But more importantly: most sport supplements are very limited in their overall nutritional profile. For a reason - for protein heavy products people tend to focus on whey and to a lesser extent casein, and most products aim to minimize other ingredients unless that are products for specific other purposes, such as weight gainers etc. They're supplements for occasional meal replacement. They are not intended to replace food in general. And exactly what appeals to me about Soylent is that it might provide a good alternative to fill those "nutritional gaps" mentioned in the Myoplex sales copy, which are pretty much inevitable if you were to stick with only regular sports supplements. As I said: I'm not interested in replacing food entirely, but having something available that I can have reasonable confidence is reasonably complete, that I know the calorie content of by volume, so it's easy to measure and keep track, and that is quick and convenient for when I don't have the time or want the hassle of sorting out a proper meal would be great.

jw_ 13y ago

Military organizations already spend a lot of time and money on food, given its overwhelming importance in things like fighting wars. I suspect "Valley nerdchow-paste" is not going to do a lot to raise morale.

jonnathanson 13y ago
"Military organizations already spend a lot of time and money on food, given its overwhelming importance in things like fighting wars" Correct, which is why military branches are deep-pocketed potential buyers. "I suspect "Valley nerdchow-paste" is not going to do a lot to raise morale." In a military context it's not a meal replacement, per se. More of an emergency MRE or HDR replacement, provided it's more shelf stable and can compete on nutritional factors. (Big ifs, of course.) I don't disagree that morale is a concern, though. MREs are nasty, but they're at least attempting to be palatable within the confines of their purpose.
microtherion 13y ago
Indeed. Military organizations have learned over several millennia that serving unappealing food to heavily armed and lethally trained people is bound to lead to suboptimal outcomes.

segmondy 13y ago

You are counting out lazy people. There are lots of lazy people who find it even a burden to grocery shop, unpack and microwave food.

kamaal 13y ago
Jeez, where are we heading to? I would consider 'microwave food' as lazy. Food is the at most basic necessity of your body, with air, water, shelter and clothes. Are people really so busy that you can't get off your keyboard to eat something? I am not sure if that is the case merely using Soylent is going to fix any of your problems.

foobarqux 13y ago

Maybe they should be a Herbalife and do multi-level marketing.

dragonwriter 13y ago

> Personally speaking, I think the B2B market makes a lot of sense for Soylent. Especially sales to the military, space agencies, and maybe even white labeling for big food companies. Last I heard, the main focus of new food efforts for the military is long-shelf-life food that does a better job of emulating "normal" food. Because it makes a pretty big difference to morale. > In the consumer space, sure, you have some "Valley geeks" who see food as more of a burden to be solved than a source of enjoyment or socialization. But you've also got folks like athletes, both professional and amateur (a much bigger consumer market). A market that's highly saturated with well-established nutritional supplements and meal substitute powders, shakes, etc. The one space where Soylent has an advantage over established market players is in marketing to Valley geeks that are insulated from the other markets for this kind of product (some of which is of the "this product is a good fit for you" type, and some of which is "this product is a solution to all kinds of other things for which there are not currently solutions" type, but both of those are marketing messages for Soylent that are mostly successful with the same demographic.)

vidarh 13y ago

I love good food. But I fall in the amateur athlete category, and for me getting the right nutrition mix is a massive chore on a day to day basis. I would never go to just Soylent, but I'd love to experiment with substituting a number of meals with it.

gotrecruit 13y ago
as an amateur athlete, it's time you learn about sports supplements. if you had, you'll come to realize there are many meal replacement products that can easily satisfy your needs and that has been around for decades. EAS myoplex is the first that comes to mind that not only has a lot of important nutrients, but actually tastes pretty good in my opinion.
- vidarh 13y ago
  The condescending tone is unwarranted and distasteful. Especially when you so totally miss the point of Soylent vs. sports supplements like Myoplex: The latter are not in any way trying to provide the same. They generally aim for roughly a certain mix of proteins, carbs and fats + various mixes of other ingredients that often seem to be chosen mostly to be buzzword complete. In fact, here's some sales copy regarding Myoplex: "EAS recommends supplementing your diet with 2-3 high quality Myoplex nutrition shakes along with 3-4 whole food meals a day to ensure that any nutritional "gaps" are filled. " I use a lot of supplements - for my protein intake I use or have used a variety of shakes, bars, muffins (yes...), cookies, to complement my high protein "real foods". To date I have never found a sports supplement that tastes nice without being way too high calorie for my use, but I can tolerate that for the convenience. But more importantly: most sport supplements are very limited in their overall nutritional profile. For a reason - for protein heavy products people tend to focus on whey and to a lesser extent casein, and most products aim to minimize other ingredients unless that are products for specific other purposes, such as weight gainers etc. They're supplements for occasional meal replacement. They are not intended to replace food in general. And exactly what appeals to me about Soylent is that it might provide a good alternative to fill those "nutritional gaps" mentioned in the Myoplex sales copy, which are pretty much inevitable if you were to stick with only regular sports supplements. As I said: I'm not interested in replacing food entirely, but having something available that I can have reasonable confidence is reasonably complete, that I know the calorie content of by volume, so it's easy to measure and keep track, and that is quick and convenient for when I don't have the time or want the hassle of sorting out a proper meal would be great.