This Plant Based Meat Company Grew Sales By 57.6% In 2025
In Germany's plant-based meat aisle, the cheap option is the one losing. Private-label volume fell 7% in 2025 even though private label cost 38% less per kilo than branded products, according to Circana data analyzed by GFI Europe, while branded volume rose slightly.
Planted's German numbers read like the brand-level version of that finding. Co-founder Pascal Bieri wrote on LinkedIn that the Swiss company's German retail sales are up 57.6% year to date with volume up 57.9%, against category growth of 12.5%, and that Planted has climbed three positions to become the eighth-largest brand by value. Promotional share went down over the same period while distribution and sales per store went up.
The numbers are company-reported
Bieri named no data provider for the German figures, so these are Planted's own numbers and not an independently published readout. They follow the same shape as the quarter before. Bieri told AgFunderNews in August that German retail sales of alt meat grew 7.2% in the first quarter while Planted's German sales grew 49%, which he attributed to wider distribution and strong velocity on the steak products.
Bieri also wrote that Planted remains a challenger, and the German data support him. Plant-based meat retail sales in Germany leveled off at 751 million euros in 2025 while volume slipped 1.7%. Domestic production of meat alternatives fell 1.2% by volume to 124,900 tonnes, the first drop after years of continuous growth. Per-capita meat consumption went the other way, rising to 54.9 kilos on preliminary figures.
Everywhere else in Europe, price did the work
The 2025 pattern across European markets was mostly about price. In France, plant-based meat volume rose 16.8% as prices fell. In Spain, volume dropped 7% as prices climbed. Germany is where that mechanism broke down, because the cheapest products on the shelf were the ones shedding volume. GFI Europe's reading is that private-label plant-based meat has not yet met shopper expectations on taste and texture, and shoppers who stayed in the category traded toward brands rather than away from them.
There are two ways to be the product someone reaches for. A company can build a cost base that lets it hold an everyday price, or it can rent the spot with a promotion and hope the shopper comes back after the yellow sticker comes off. The first shows up as sales per store. The second shows up in the P&L.
Bieri has been explicit about which one Planted is chasing. He called Germany "the most difficult retail market in the world" and said the lesson there was that price matters, which is why the company works to an internal target of producing a kilogram of meat for two dollars, one dollar in raw materials and one in processing and packaging.
Distribution is the other half of the story
Sales per store only counts once a product is in stores. Planted's Crispy range sells through REWE and EDEKA in Germany, and its Memmingen plant in Bavaria, opened in 2025, makes the fermented whole cuts including planted.steak. That site runs about eight tons a day, and Planted makes 20 to 25 tons a day across Memmingen and its Swiss facility in Kemptthal, split evenly between retail and foodservice. Bieri told AgFunderNews the company has listings with Tesco, Albert Heijn and Carrefour but prioritized the German, Austrian and Swiss markets because capacity is scarce. The German growth is partly a decision about where to point a constrained supply.
German retailers have been handing out shelf space this year. Eat Just launched Just Egg with REWE in January and is now in more than 500 REWE stores with an Edeka listing added, as CEO Josh Tetrick told vegconomist. Distribution gains and rate-of-sale gains arriving together is the combination that survives a category review, and that is what Planted is claiming.
Growth is not the only thing happening at the company. Bieri told AgFunderNews that Planted cut around 11% of its workforce over the past year, concentrated in global management roles in Switzerland and in markets where the business model is shifting, and he would not comment on runway, funding plans or the path to profitability. SWI swissinfo.ch reported in April, citing the trade union newspaper Work, that headcount stood at around 150, while the company put its own figure at 200 at the end of 2025. Planted has raised roughly 115 million Swiss francs since 2019.
The thing to watch next is whether Planted's protein starts appearing under names that are not Planted. Bieri told AgFunderNews the company is doubling capacity at Memmingen and weighing whether to supply its fermented protein to local brands, manufacturers or butchers, a change for a business that has sold under its own label since 2019. A brand that just climbed to eighth by value in Germany turning into a supplier for the brands above it would be a different company than the one posting these numbers.
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