IFPA Takes on Tech

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Welcome to PMA Takes on Tech, the podcast that explores the problems, solutions, people and ideas that are shaping the future of the produce industry. I'm your host, Bonnie Estes, vice president of technology for the produce marketing association. And I've spent years in the agtech sector.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

So I can attest, it's hard to navigate this ever changing world and developing and adopting new solutions to industry problems. Thanks for joining us and for allowing us to serve as your guide to the new world of produce and technology. My goal of the podcast is to outline a problem in the produce industry and then discuss several possible solutions that can be deployed today.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

This season of PMA Takes on Tech is brought to you by Plenty. Plenty is an indoor vertical farm that sustainably grows produce using less water and land than traditional farming and no pesticides or GMOs. The farm is able to grow peak season, flavorful food year round and deliver fresh produce to its retail partners, daily.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Plenty's proprietary towers and intelligent platform, make it the only vertical farm that can grow multiple crops with consistently superior flavors and yield. Today's conversation is with Dana Worth, senior vice president at Plenty. I originally knew Dana from Impossible Foods, where he spent nearly six years as VP of sales and in business operations.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Dana is a wealth of information on commercializing products in mission driven companies in high growth stages. We talk about the push and pull of retailers and consumers for healthy, nutritious food. Let's jump into the conversation with Dana on his role at Plenty and some learnings from Impossible Foods.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

So I run our sales, marketing and comms teams here at Plenty, collectively, we call that the commercial team. I have been at the company since January of 2021, so about 11 months as of now. And it's been a really fun and exciting time, so far. I joined Plenty after spending almost six years at Impossible Foods, just down the road here in California.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

At Impossible Foods, I joined in 2015 as an early commercial hire and has spent a lot of time focused on how to bring our first product there, the impossible burger to market. So when I joined Impossible in 2015, we were still about a year and a half from launching David Chan's restaurant, Momofuku, in New York City in July of 2016.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And I helped design that launch, build the commercial team. When I first started, it was me. I did everything from answering all the e-customer service emails in the inbox to going on sales calls with a griddle that we'd bought at Walmart and kind of dragged down the street behind us to thinking about securing our first social media, Instagram handle, all the way up through leading the deals with Burger King and Starbucks, which are still standing today for the Impossible Walker and in the Impossible Breakfast Sandwich.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

My interest in the industry really started with Impossible Foods. I had had very little exposure to food and ag prior to Impossible Foods. I'd been working in some healthcare work, I'd been working in emerging markets, I'd been working in FinTech most recently with PayPal, but when I meant Pat Brown and the team over at Impossible, I became really interested in how important the food system is to the planet and the people who live on it.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And as I've learned more and more about the food system, I've really become convinced that it's pretty much the closest thing we have to a silver bullet to solve many of the problems facing the planet and the people who live here. Conversely, actually one of the things that can be most negatively impactful to the planet, if we don't address some of those issues. The way I think about it is the food system, there are six to seven billion people who are consumers into the system every day for many people, multiple times a day.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

There's another one, two billion people who are producers into the system every single day. It obviously impacts our environment, it impacts human health, impacts the animals who live on this planet as well. And I can't think of a single system. The energy system doesn't do that, the healthcare system, the education system, I can't think of a single system that impacts so many human beings every day.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And what's interesting to me about that is obviously the chance to have an impact a positive out on the world. So from a mission standpoint, both impossible foods and plenty are mission focused mission first companies, but also as a business person, I mean, what an incredible place to build a business, right? How often do you have the chance to access every human being on the planet as a potential customer?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Not many businesses can claim that, total addressable market, as say, it's been really interesting watching since 2015, when I entered into the industry, just how much focus has come into the industry. Obviously we all see the headlines about the capital that's been invested and how that's been going up, up, up over recent years.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

I'm of the mind that that's still... We're still massively under investing in the industry. Given the aspects I just mentioned, given how many people are consumers, how many people are producers and how big the challenges are. So I'm sort of a big tenter on this, I believe that it's going to take many, many companies, many, many entrepreneurs, many, many solutions to get to where we need to go, because the scale of the challenge is so great.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Yeah. That's... It's so true. And I think, like you said, working for both those companies and having an impact, those are two really impactful areas. So indoor ag is playing an increasingly incremental role in our fresh produce supply. What are the key factors driving this? And is this a fad, as some people think? A very well invested fad, or is it here to stay?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah. I think there's two, as with any of these trends, there's kind of two sides to this. One is the push and the other is the pull. So I'll start with the pull, which is the consumer. Consumers, aren't out there saying we want indoor ag, right? Most people probably don't even know how their food is grown today, let alone think about, the differences between indoor and outdoor and all the variations thereof.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

But consumers have been voting very strongly over the last couple decades that they do care about how their food is made, even if they don't fully understand it, right? The growth and prominence of organic is a perfect example of consumers caring, right? And consumers, voting their dollars on how they care. My belief is they care about things, obviously taste, right?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

We all know that taste is number one, that being said, everything in the grocery store is designed to be tasty, for the most part, burritos are tasty, ice cream is tasty, there's lots of things that are tasty. So saying that... I think of taste is necessary, but not sufficient condition.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

If you're not tasty, that's going to be a problem. But just because you're tasty doesn't mean that you're going to succeed. The second, really big one, I think, especially in the produce space is cleanliness. And I think there's kind of a lurking unknown in consumer's minds about cleanliness. So what does that mean? Why are some things no need to wash, but some are triple washed and some I have to wash at home and some, what is... There's kind of a... I think a... Like I said, a lurking belief of, I'm not quite sure what exactly is on my produce.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

And do you think that's tied to food safety, like staying safe with the food that you eat or is it more dirt or is it more insecticides or is it all those things?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah. I think it probably doesn't... For most consumers doesn't break down into any particular components, more of a, dirty is bad. I'm not quite sure how it's bad. It could be as bad as, my gosh, I could end up sick. And I see these, certainly people are aware of recalls, but it could be as minor as, this looks dirty, right? Even if it's completely harmless.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

The other thing is, I think... Way I think about it is produce in some ways is not a great consumer experience, right? If you were to just step back and think about produce as a product, where else in the grocery store, do you have things that when you get them home, you could have a third or half the pack not be what it was represented to be, right?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

It could be rotten, it could be moldy, it could be something you didn't think you were buying, you also, depending on what time of year you buy it, what time of week you buy it, depending on the store you buy it at, you can get a completely different product, right? A strawberry is not a strawberry, a strawberry can be many different things, depending on when and where you buy it.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And a product that you often end up throwing a large amount away because it goes bad or goes bad in your fridge. If you think about that in the context of the grocery store, if Cheerios had those... That value proposition, it would be a terrible product, right? Like, Hey, by the way, Cheerios are different depending on where you get them, what time of year you get them, oftentimes they go bad and you don't know exactly what they're going to taste like before you open the packet.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

People wouldn't buy that product. And I actually think it's a testimony to how important produce is in people's lives that people continue to buy produce, even despite all the downsides that come along with that product. And so that's, that's the framework I use for thinking about what can any production system, whether it's indoor ag or otherwise, what are the solutions we can bring to the consumer? It's about making it a more reliable product, it's about making it a cleaner... Put cleaner on quotes, but a 'cleaner' product in consumer's minds about making it a more nutritious product, making it something that I can get what I'm expecting to get.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

So how do you think what Plenty is doing in your technology can solve that issue, especially around strawberries, since I know you're working on strawberries.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah. So I think the obvious... One of the obvious solutions here is by being able to provide a consistent environment and being able to control all the knobs like we can at Plenty, we can produce a great strawberry. We believe in conjunction with our partners at Driscolls, year round.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And it's always a great day as well. Like I say, it's always a great day in Watsonville inside a plenty farm. So as some of your listeners may know, we've been... We have a publicly announced partnership with Driscolls, where we're working with their world class genetics, as well as our world class indoor environment with the goal of producing really game changing strawberries. So that's an area, not the only area, but certainly an area where indoor ag to original question can really deliver some big gains.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

And are you publicly making any prediction of when I may have Plenty strawberries in my refrigerator?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

I am not publicly making any predictions about Plenty strawberries, but we will get you some point fun.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Good. I'm looking forward to that. So how can companies like Plenty increase awareness about CEA among retailers of how it is different from organic or non GMO or many of the other different types of categories?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah. I think that's a great point and actually comes back to the push side. So we were talking about the pull from the consumer, the push from the retailer. In the long run, the retailers' interest aligned with the consumer's interest, but in the short, medium run, that's not always the case.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And especially right now with all the supply chain challenges that retailers have had, labor challenges retailers have had, and general COVID challenges retailers have had over the last year and a half, they've got their hands full, for sure. And so they are oftentimes solving for related, but somewhat different things. So, we hear from a lot of retailers that reducing recalls would be a huge benefit to them. Just that is one of the biggest things that disrupts their produce department on a, what seemingly consistent basis that is.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

It's a huge pain point for them. We also hear, consistency, just being able to know when I'm going to have product, know when I'm going to be able to stock my shelves, right? They're trying to run a business, they've got a lot of different pieces to manage and having something that's so volatile makes it really challenging to run that business.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

I've also heard from most produce managers that that's why they love produce by the way that they love... They went into that business because they love the dynamic nature of it. But that is a... It's a constant struggle that they're trying to manage. The other thing we're hearing from retailers is that they want to ensure their supply going forward. So everyone is thinking about, how do I make sure that whether it's supply chain difficulties, whether it's supply related pressures on the field, they want to make sure that, obviously they're going to be able to keep their shelf stocked.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And as they think towards the future they're looking at controlled environment or indoor agriculture is a way to make sure that they have consistent access to the products that they know their consumers want. So that's what we're hearing from retailers. What's interesting is they're is I think a shared understanding between retailers and other indoor folks or indoor folks that we do need to figure out how to talk to the consumer about this.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And I'll use an analogy from my Impossible days, until Impossible and Beyond really started coming out with some of the more innovative products that we debuted in the mid 2010. So in 2015, 2016, 2017, everything was a veggie burger, right? Like if you ever had a Dr. Prager's or a morning star burger, those were... It was a veggie burger, that was the term.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

That's what I grew up with around the time that Impossible and Beyond started releasing their products plant based, became... A term that was well... Became better known by consumers to the point, now, when you walk into many retail groceries, you'll see plant-based as a section heading.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And the interesting thing about plant-based is, plant-based has a lot of positive connotations. So if you were to walk out and grab a consumer out of a grocery store and say, what is plant-based, you'll say, it's probably better for you, better for the environment, something that I try to do, I'm doing my part to try to make my life or the planet's life healthier. And that became kind of a code word, a short code for consumers in a complex grocery store and a way to make decisions. And we haven't had that moment yet for indoor or CEA, neither of those terms mean anything to a consumer.CEA in particular is a pretty terrible consumer term.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Yes. Yeah.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And so one of the things that I think both retailers and.... I certainly recognize, I would imagine other indoor producers recognize is the need to have what I think of as our plant-based moment. Like, what is the term that we can put out into the world that neatly summarizes the value and the benefits to the consumer, as opposed to a description of the production method, which is not particularly useful, CEA or indoor is not particularly useful to the consumer. And organic's an interesting case study where it was a description of a production method that has come to mean something to the consumer. Not because they're necessarily thinking there's a particular process, right?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

But they does have this... It is a term that has this kind of set of benefits behind it, that consumer... I'm sure every consumer thinks about it a little differently, we know many consumers don't think about it correctly, but that's not necessarily important.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

They think of it as this set of benefits that they can count on when they are in the store. And we haven't had that moment yet for what we do. And it's going to be a big part of my focus going forward. And I would invite others in the industry to join me as well. I think it benefits everyone, going back to what I said in the beginning, the challenges we face around the food and ag system are too big to be tackled by any one company alone.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

So what would that mean to a consumer? If you could communicate, We're growing this indoors or we're growing this vertically, and the consumer would go, that means these benefits, so what kind of benefits are you trying to communicate to them that they would think I want to buy this because of all the... This bucket of benefits?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah. It goes back to what I was saying about the ways in which produce is kind of a broken product. So it would be you're going to get what it's says on the label. Meaning if it says delicious strawberries, they're delicious strawberries, you're going to get something that is clean, right?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

So if it's no need to wash, it truly is no need to wash and it's not going to be... I can count on it being clean. And I think being clean, we hold ourselves to a standard, for example, we say no pesticides on our product because we believe actually a lot of what consumers want when they're thinking about clean is, is no pesticides and correctly, of course, right? Pesticides are the thing that most consumers should be worried about.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

So that's a big part of it. And then I think the consistency as well. So knowing that... And it's related to getting what it says in the label, but it's a slightly different thing, knowing that I can buy this product 52 weeks a year and I'm going to get something that I or my kids will enjoy.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

I think for me, your market research of one here is that it's just how long it lasts in the shelf life. And that I know that whatever it says on the label, it's going to last at least till that date and probably longer. And it's going to last longer than a couple of days after I buy it, no matter what. So, I think for me, that's a huge benefit and I think that's one thing that people who grow other ways are going to need to step up a little bit to meet that demand of consumers that, we just have longer shelf lives, especially in supply chains, the way that they are.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah. And that's a great point. And obviously with indoor, there's a few ways we can address that, putting production closer to consumption is the obvious one, but even more minor things like when we... Because of how we harvest, we're able to go from harvest into a cold tunnel, into refrigeration within seconds, not days, not hours, not days, not the [inaudible 00:18:27] going days, but not hours, right?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And been doing so we're able to kind of freeze the product in time and get it out to consumers faster. So there's a few... There's the obvious one of location and food miles, but there's also some other things that you can do when you have such tight control over your system.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Yeah. So how does this work, you think, as far as where it fits both in how it works in cannibalizing outdoor growing and then I've heard people talk about it. I heard one retailer say, well, I only have room on my shelf for these leafy greens in a package for a certain amount.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

And so I'm going to take... I'm going to put indoor grown in there and I'm going to get rid of organic, I'm not going to carry organic anymore. So just when you think about... I think my view right now is the pie is continuing to kind of get bigger. We've got great products and the pie is going to get bigger, but that can't go on forever. So at some point the retailer and the consumer is going to have to make a decision of what do I buy? And then how does that affect organic and then outdoor growing? How do you kind of see it shaking out going forward?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah. I think if you zoom out and think about the retailers store, obviously shelf space is there it's a premium, but it's a little more complicated in produce because refrigerated shelf space is actually the premium, the premium that we're all trading.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

If you listen to every retailers, every public retailers, earnings calls, strategy days, et cetera, fresh, fresh, fresh, fresh, fresh, right? Fresh is their number one priority. Fresh is what brings continues to bring consumers into the store. I joked a few times that fresh is to retail brick and mortar retail, what ESPN is to cable, right? It's the reason why you keep your cable subscription, it's the reason why people keep going into stores. I believe in a future where we're going to, if you're not already, most people will be buying their toilet paper and they're reaper towels online.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And that they're going to continue to go into the store for things... For meat fish and produce. And retailers have all know this, obviously, that's why they talk about it with their investors, that's why they're making massive investments in the fresh space. And so to put a finer point on your... On about growing the pie. Sure, but literally actually physically talking about growing the sections in the store, right?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Growing the section, growing the perimeter, growing the refrigerated space in the stores, right? Doing all that to make sure they've got room to bring more fresh in. So there's... I think that's a very real thing. And it aligns very well with retailer strategies right now, there's also within the refrigerated fresh cases, there's, it's not just produce that's in there, right? So there's tradeoffs with other products, so you can even within the given set space you have today, you can expand, produce relative to the other fresh refrigerated items.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And then there's of course, as you mentioned, trade offs, within the fresh... Within a given set of fresh produce, I think that there's... What's interesting about that is, at least the way we think about it at Plenty is, we can help partner with existing field growers.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

We were down... You and I were both down at Western Growers Association a couple weeks ago, and we were there looking to make friends, not enemies. We believe that we can partner with existing growers to help them grow in this way, because we believe that this is the way forward. And so while you might see, when it gets down to the fine point might see cannibalization again after the third layer down here, but you might see cannibalization between outdoor and indoor grown products.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Behind that you might see, and we believe you will see outdoor growers investing in indoor grown techniques. And so is that it may not be canalization from the producer side. It may be just a trade up for consumers to product that we believe brings more benefit to the consumer and what they're getting today.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Yeah. I think it may end up being just kind of a portfolio of different ways to grow. So I consider myself a producer, I produce these kinds of products, leafy greens or others, and I do it outside here, I do it inside here. So it's just kind of risk mitigation, especially with climate change, I think, and here in California, as we worry more and more about water availability, I think it's smart for the outdoor growers to say, do I need to have a risk portfolio... Risk adjusted portfolio of the way that I grow things?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah. Absolutely. And to the extent that the folks who are listening to this podcast are outdoor growers. Those are conversations that we're already having and are eager to have more of. So I'd love to include anyone who's interested in learning more.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Great. So one of the things that you've done in your role, which I think was a bit of a new role when you came, was building relationships with retailers and really looking at as Plenty grows and you grow your... Open the farm in Compton, and you start some other farms, just really having those different retailers that are in different parts of the country and kind of how do you work with them. So what's that been like for you? And when you walk in to talk to retailers new, do you have to explain everything or do they kind of know what's going on?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah. It's been really great. I mean, it's probably my favorite part of the job is spending time with our customers. In this case, it's retailers, you know at Impossible, I focus mostly on food service operators here at Plenty, I've been working mostly with retailers. I was lucky to be introduced as I came into our partners at Safeway Albertsons, so Plenty has a publicly announced a deal we did back in 2019 with the... Sorry, 2020, rather, with Safeway Albertsons to be partners in our California expansion, once the Compton farm is up and running.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And so those were some relationships that were already built, but we've continued to have really productive conversations, both with retailers here in California, as well as across the country. And like I said, I enjoy it because I think that there are visionaries within all of these retailers who are thinking about the future and thinking about how to move their business to the next level.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And connecting with those people is really gratifying because it's like you find that person who sees the world in the same way that you do. And when you have a partner like that, you can actually create a ton of value. And so I'll give an example, like when you connect with the person who also says, yes, we need to figure out what the plant-based quote unquote moment is for this industry. How do we communicate this to the retailer or to the consumer?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Well, now you have all the tools in place, right? You have the retailer who has control over their shells. You have us as the producer who has control over how we grow and together, if we have a shared mission to communicate to the consumer. Well, wow. Now we can do a whole lot.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

So I've enjoyed building those relationships. I view as, you can probably tell, I view them as partnerships where we're... Like, we've learned a lot as Plenty in the last eight years building this company, we have obviously points of view on the future and where the industry is going. And the opportunity to share those points of views with retailers is fantastic. One of the most fun things to do is actually to bring folks up to our research facility in Laramie Wyoming. So we have...

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

In the summer, right?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

I'll go whenever they want go. I'm a east coaster originally and I miss winter sometimes. So I...

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Well, you can get that in Laramie.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah. It was 13 degree last time I was there last week. So I enjoy... We have about just over 60 people there full-time R&D plant science about just over a dozen PhDs. And the first time I went, I joked, it was kind of like Santa's workshop. We've got bunch of different production environments where we're testing. And it's really where a lot of the... It's the core of our plant science work that happens there, obviously located there because Nate story, our co-founder did all of his graduate work at university of Wyoming.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And we still have a really good, strong set of folks coming out of the university there. And I think when we bring retailers there, it often helps connect the dots for how... What we're doing is really technology and innovation based. And we've made this massive investment in technology that will benefit them, right? Like we've made that investment and the retailers get to reap the rewards of it and getting to tell that story is really exciting.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Yeah. I bet that's really cool to take people who work in produce and see the product all day to a place. I haven't been to Laramie. I've seen a lot of your research in South San Francisco, but it... That must be really enlightening to them, because it looks so different than Salina's, which is great in its own way, but this is something they haven't seen before. So that must be very fun.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah. It's getting kind of wide. I still get wide eye to them thinking about all the different knobs you can turn, all the different dials you can turn, when you have that degree of control, how much more light can you put into the system? What are cultivars that we can grow? For example, that may have been because they weren't fit for purpose outdoors. So there's all sorts of fun things you can do when you have these kinds of environments.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

You had mentioned food service when you're talking about Impossible, are you working in food service at all with Plenty? Are you trying to supply that part of that segment?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

We are currently in retail. So the way that I think about things today is, we are currently in about 50 retailers here in Northern California that is supplied entirely out of our South San Francisco farm, which is sold out and has been for some time. That is kind of partially an R&D farm and partially a commercial farm. Really our big expansion is coming when we open the Compton facility next year down in Southern California.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

That'll be our big debut from a branding commercial standpoint. And we... I do think there's a case for the product and food service. As you mentioned, I was... Spent quite a bit of time in food service in my days at Impossible. And I think there's a case for the same reason, there's a case in retail, consumers don't care about how their product is made, they care about quality and those things are all very much things that you can communicate in a food service environment. And I think food service operators, at least certain food service operators would be very interested.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

I think so, too. So there's been a big shift in consumer behavior over the last 12 months or so what are consumers craving in a post pandemic world and how can retailers ensure they're delivering the demand for fresher produce to consumers?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah, it's a great question. There's obviously a bit of a roller coaster and not just the initial COVID into pieces, but the subsequent supply chain challenges. One of the thing... My view is that some of these habits will stick, but people are creatures of habit, meaning a lot of what people move to will eventually revert.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

The things that I think will stick are, I do believe that the cooking at home lessons that people were forced to teach themselves, will have enduring ramifications. So whether that means more meals at home or just higher quality and ingredients in meals at home, I think that we'll see that in treating that meal more like a, not treating like a restaurant experience, but treating it more like a... Or being able to have a premium experience at home, I guess, is how I would think about it.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And that'll obviously have positive ramifications for cart size and ring in store. I'm saying that's one I... Like I said before, I do think that for staples people will very much continue to move white goods onto recurring purchases on Amazon or elsewhere and not need to go to the store. But I think that the folks who did move over for fresh, certainly some of them will stay doing online grocery for fresh, but that there's going to be a certain amount of returning to the store.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

I mean, where you saw it, certain amount of returning to the store when it's safe to do so, just because people value that fresh experience and by the way, the brick and mortar retailers know this right and so they're innovating, as I mentioned before, they're innovating on this fresh experience to make it an attractive place to come.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Yeah. I've seen some when I was at CES, I think it was a couple years ago and they were showing like the grocery store, the future where everything that now is in the center of the store is upstairs. And so they'd have it upstairs and it's all managed by robots where you go in and you place the order for all those things, and then you pick all your produce and then you go to the checkout and your toilet paper and your razor blades and paper tiles are already packed. And so just have the store, be this beautiful place of flowers and produce and the rest of stuff is upstairs.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And discovery, right? The other... When I think about the value that brick and mortar retailer has, it's twofold, it's discovery. So it's very hard to discover new things online. Meaning like, it's just you don't have the same feeling of brows, right? Of course you can, if you're really dogged and diligent, but it doesn't have quite the same experience. Although, there's a cheese that I had never bought before, but it looks interesting, right?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

That's that's experience that I have when I'm in the grocery store and then it's immediacy, right? It's okay. I need this thing today, I need it now, the second one though, is being, could potentially be eroded by some of the... Both the fast grocery delivery and the ultra fast grocery delivery that is just now expanding in the U.S. So I again, retailers, I think know this and they are really focusing on that fresh experience in store.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Yeah. Well, my last question, and you've talked about this a little bit, but you and I first met when you were at possible, in Impossible Foods and I was doing some work there as well. And so it's interesting. I mean, it's kind of a Silicon valley, wonder story that you've worked for these two really amazing companies that have fast growth curves and are kind of market definers. So can you talk a little bit more about what some of the parallels are? And what are some of the differences and some of the things that you've learned and in working for two companies like this?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah. It's been... I've been really lucky to work with some incredible people on some incredible ideas. For me, it comes back to the mission. The reason why I'm interested in this space in the first place is it's the... As I said, it's the place where I think you have the biggest ability to make the biggest change for the most amount of people on the planet.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And why not focus on the system that touches the most people every single day and has the biggest delta in my belief between where we are now and where we need to be, or where we could be, within that space that creates lots of opportunities for mission based companies. And you see them not just in Impossible and Plenty, but many others [inaudible 00:33:44] company, called Clara that does egg... Fermentation based egg replacements.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And there's 100, if not 1000 others now. And I think that's super exciting. The key though, for me, is these companies exist for the mission, right? Like we used to say it in Impossible, if we could achieve the mission, we would shut down the company tomorrow, the company doesn't exist for its own self perpetuation.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

It exists to serve a mission and the same, thing's true for Plenty, we exist to serve a mission. We have a view of what the future world should look like, and we are all in on getting there and then we can be done, right? And the reality is, of course the mission is so big that it's going to be a long time before we're done.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Won't be our lifetime probably.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

But when you work for a company like that, it really helps clarify decisions. It helps clarify, why we choose A over B, why we invest in a certain way, who we hire, how we make decisions at the management team level. And so that's what I'd say is shared between Impossible and Plenty, is working for a mission based company.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And then obviously in a sector that, as I mentioned, I think has an incredible ability to impact our future. It's also, as I mentioned before, it's really exciting to work with partners, whether it's partners like dress goals or retailer partners like Safeway Albertsons who share that vision for the future and finding those people who say, yeah, I do believe that there's a different way that the future's going to look from today and it's both the... It's the struggle and the fun, right?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And at Impossible, I... On more than one occasion was cursed at in people's kitchens. So I went... And I was in there, especially in the early days, they thought I was some crazy hippie from California with a veggie burger, trying to ruin their kitchen. And I was told to, and not nice term to get out and go the other way. But in some ways it's interesting, right? When people feel that passionately about something like, you know you're onto an important issue. And I have not been cursed at yet at Plenty, thankfully, but there...

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Maybe greens may not be quite so controversial.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Hey, you. But berries, people feel strongly about their berries.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Yeah. That's true.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

But it's an opportunity. The flip side of that is the opportunity when, as I said to partner with folks who share that vision all across the industry and the ability to see that come into fruition. And so I'm almost seven years out at Impossible. And it still makes me smile every time I walk into a Starbucks and I see the Impossible breakfast sandwich right there on the menu, right?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

That's something that we brought into the world and I believe the same is true for Plenty. Like we're going to be sitting here six, seven years from now. Maybe we can do it another podcast interview then. And think... Looking at the farms we've built and the products that are on shelf and knowing that we with our partners brought that into the world.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

Is there any thing culturally, in addition to the mission of both companies and being very mission driven, anything about the culture of these companies or the management, or any parallels or differences there?

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Yeah. I think there's something that's really invigorating about this particular stage in the company. So we're at the stage Plenty of great. We've been investing for the better part of a decade in our technology, in our system. And we're now building this farm in Compton that'll be the largest indoor farm by output when it opens next year.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

And we're just on the verge of taking all the hard work that the engineers and the scientists have done and turning it into something, turning it into a product, turning a commercial enterprise. And that particular transition point, I went through that transition at Impossible, same thing, hundreds of millions of dollars spent on upfront technology before a single product was ever in the market. That turning point is a real kind of, in the foxhole together type, turning point where you are... You've got a small group of people.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

Usually the companies are quite, still relatively small at this stage as Plenty is, who are working really closely together to make this happen. So I certainly experienced that at Impossible. We have that here at Plenty where we've got a really good group of people who are here because they really even what we're doing. And because of that it's a great culture.

Dana Worth, Plenty:

I love this piece of it. And actually, I think one of the biggest risks to companies as they get more successful is they attract people who chase success as opposed to attract people who are interested in the process, interested in the way you get there. Everyone can identify the successes after the fact. It's more of... I admire more, I want to work more with people who love the process of getting there.

Vonnie Estes, PMA:

That's it for this episode of PMA Takes on Tech, thanks for allowing us to serve as your guide to the new world of produce and technology. Be sure to check out all our episodes at pma.com and wherever you get your podcast. Please subscribe and I would love to get any comments or suggestions of what you might want me need to take on. For now, stay safe, eat your fruits and vegetables, and we will see you next time.