Positive Food meals go into more Whole Foods, Bristol Farms – TechCrunch
Summary
We gained sort of a cult following because we had healthy meals at an accessible price point.The pair eventually did more than 100 popups before setting up wholesale accounts with local coffee shops where it was selling meals, which include the Vegan Kale Hemp Caesar; the Roasted Beet, Chicken and Goat Cheese Salad; and the Vegan Peanut Butter Overnight Oats. It also was in the midst of moving to a new, larger facility to manage that new business.In March, Positive Food was just a few weeks shy of launching that pilot before the whole world went into lockdown. The pilot didnt happen, and even though the company had to wait another nine months, it eventually entered Whole Foods.What kind of saved us was talking with Whole Foods, Deerman said. These are some things Deerman believes would not have been quickly possible if their original operations were still in full effect.During all of that revamping, they made the decision not to go back into the coffee shop business and instead focus on Whole Foods. It has since expanded its locations with them and are now in Bristol Farms locations, including 86 throughout California.Today, the company announced $7 million in new funding from investors including BlueYard Capital, Western Tech, Y Combinator, Gaingels and a group of entrepreneurs, including Thrive Market CEO Nick Green, Instacart co-founder Max Mullen, Fitbit CEO James Park, Docker co-founder Solomon Hykes, Faire CTO Marcelo Cortes, Season CEO Josh Hix, Exactuals CEO Mike Hurst, Foursquare co-founder Naveen Selvadurai, WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg, Timehop co-founder Jonathan Wegener and Behance founder Scott Belsky.Much of the demand, as of late, for freshly prepared foods is from consumers shifting to healthier lifestyles, which has even prompted grocery stores to provide more ready-to-eat meals to cater to consumers popping in quickly to pick up food.Positive Foods vertical integration technology is mainly done in-house, including production and a cold-chain logistics network.