The first time Fernando Machado heard about NotCo was when he was chief marketing officer at Burger King in 2020. The name of the company stood out to him. “The Not Company,” recalls Machado. “All of the products are Not something. Not Milk, Not Burger. I thought that was really interesting, because the type of marketing that I like to do is about breaking norms.”
Machado was impressed by the Chile-based startup and how they were using AI to develop plant-based food. Fast forward to June 2023, and he is now three months into his post as chief marketing officer of the company – an offer he could not refuse, as the startup already has a $1.5 billion valuation pre-IPO.
“It was a once in a lifetime opportunity to join this company,” says Machado, who left the post as CMO of Activision Blizzard –a job he was very happy with– to join the startup. “The fact that the company is pre-IPO. I felt that if I didn’t join and things went the way I think they will go. I would regret it.”
Despite a career working for major brands, Machado has always had a startup mindset. “I have a challenger brand mindset in trying to do more with less,” he says. “At RBI, the biggest competitor had 4x the budget I had. We had to do scrappy things, move fast and break things. NotCo is a really good fit and match for the type of marketing I enjoy doing.”
NotCo sells plant-based alternatives to popular foods like burgers, chicken and milk. The company also has co-branded partnerships such as Kraft Heinz Not Cheese Kraft Singles. Their Not Milk is served at Starbucks and Shake Shack. Their plant-based chicken products are served at Burger Kings in eight countries.
Machado will be speaking at Brand Innovators Garden stage at Cannes on Tuesday June 20th. We caught up with him from his home office in Miami to talk about the new role, brand partnerships and how AI is disrupting the plant-based food space. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
How are you using AI to create plant-based food?
It’s not just that our products are becoming a better match of animal derived products –what I call plant-based 1.0 – but when we use AI to create products that go beyond the normally derived product. We already have prototypes of flavors. We can brief our AI to come up with food that brings you emotions like joy or childhood memories. We can deliver health or functional benefits. We are quick to disrupt many product categories.
We are launching products with really strong brands like Kraft Heinz. We just launched Kraft Singles Not Cheese, which has co-branding with Not Co. It is almost like the Intel inside. We launched Not Mayo, which is a pure brand Not Co. product with Kraft-Heinz. There is a lot more coming in the pipeline. The jackpot is going to be even further disruption of the product categories using AI to create products. The animal version is not the ceiling anymore.
How does the AI work to create a flavor like joy?
The name is inspired by the Italian artist Giuseppe Arcimboldo. He used to do portraits of people using fruits and vegetables. Our AI basically uses plants to create products. The AI keeps evolving as we provide feedback on recipes that the AI proposes. The more ingredients we feed through the AI, the smarter it gets. We can do things such as analyze chocolate. It’s almost like we created the DNA of chocolate. We do a chromatography study of physical properties and such. We do all the analysis and feed those variables to the AI. We tell the AI, create a flavor that you think people will like based on the fact that people like this. It is like your Spotify playlist. We can say, I want to create a flavor that brings people joy. It can create and then we test and then provide feedback and refine it.
Can you talk about your partnerships with brands?
When I do a partnership with Starbucks in Mexico, that is a great sampling mechanism and a massive endorsement to the caliber of our brand. For our Kraft Heinz partnership, Not Cheese Kraft Singles are sold in Walmart, Target and Sprouts where we can brand build. When you compound our direct sales to consumers through retailers with food services from Starbucks or Shake Shack and the partnerships with Kraft Heinz, it really creates a mechanism to accelerate growth and awareness of the brand. One of the key things for Not Co. is reinventing the food industry to create a more sustainable world. We believe in partnerships not just because it’s the right thing for the brand but it is the right thing to make an impact in terms of sustainability.
Can you talk about sustainability and what that means for your brand?
Even before the AI angle, the whole brand was started with our founder questioning why not create a more sustainable brand in the food space. The plant-based part of this is essential. Every single one of our products uses much less water energy or CO2 emissions than the comparative animal-derived product. If we really want to make a difference when it comes to sustainability, the way we approach food is really critical. Anything that is plant-based has a much better footprint. AI is the way we develop the products but with the purpose is to develop the food industry to become more sustainable.
Can you talk about jumping from selling burgers to selling plant-based products?
All the products that we have are vegan, which doesn’t mean that vegan is the main target audience. Most of the volume that we sell is to people like me. I’m not vegan. I’m flexitarian. I eat animal products in most categories, but I try to eat more and more plant based. Most people are exactly like I am. Most of my vegan friends don’t crave beef alternatives, because they stopped eating beef so long ago. It’s more an alternative for flexitarians than anything else.
When I was at Burger King, we were the driving force to launch the plant-based Whopper. We did the Impossible Whopper in the US. The experience that I had in fast food was relevant for this job, because we were already shifting fast food to become more plant-based. I led a lot of the work in terms of ESG and improving the quality of the food at Burger King, which is something that is relevant for this job too. I worked in foods for Unilever before. It helps to understand the retail space. It helps to understand the food service space from the time I was in QSR. Even the Activision role, most of the marketing that we do, is not broadcast TV. It is very digital.
Can you talk about your recent Old Animal campaign and your approach to consumer marketing?
Old Animals is an Instagram campaign. It actually helps sell products but it was conceived of as a master brand campaign to help people understand that we use AI to develop our products and that we don’t have animals in our products. It is done in a very creative way with a sprinkle of media –a strong push in social and a strong push on PR. This is how I envision the communication architecture. We have a base layer but that doesn’t mean that needs to be boring.
I try to make sure that even on the most product-centric campaign, that we have something that gives back to the audience in terms of a smile or shock value. It needs to trigger something in you, bolder ideas that will probably not require a huge amount of media because it’s more focused on earned media and shareability. It’s more organic.
So we won’t be seeing you at the Super Bowl next year?
You never know, but we have some boxes to check before we make that kind of investment.
