Unilever to Sell Plant-Based Meat Brand The Vegetarian Butcher to JBS-Owned Vivera

Unilever has agreed to sell The Vegetarian Butcher to fellow plant-based meat business Vivera, with the deal expected to be completed by Q3 2025.

Four months after it first emerged that Unilever was planning to offload The Vegetarian Butcher as part of its portfolio shakeup, it has accepted a non-binding offer to sell the business to fellow Dutch meat-free company Vivera.

The latter – itself owned by the world’s largest meat company, JBS – submitted a binding offer for an undisclosed sum to acquire The Vegetarian Butcher. The deal is subject to the usual closing conditions, regulatory requirements, and consultation processes, and expected to be completed by Q3 this year.

Unilever, which bought The Vegetarian Butcher in 2018, said the brand no longer aligned with the requirements of its wider portfolio, and the divergence made a sale the best option. It enlisted Piper Sandler to handle the transaction.

The wider picture, though, is that this is part of the CPG giant’s Growth Action Plan 2030 (GAP2030). It intends to clear out brands collectively worth around £1B in annual sales, sharpening its focus on its 30 ‘power brands’ – like Hellmann’s, Dove, Knorr, and Surf – which represent over three-quarters of its turnover.

“I believe that The Vegetarian Butcher is poised for even greater success in the next phase of its journey under new ownership that is dedicated to plant-based meat replacements,” said Unilever Foods president Heiko Schipper. “This focused expertise will support the brand in its ambitious goal to become the ‘Biggest Butcher of the World’.”

Unique supply chain and tech needs necessitated sale

One of the world’s leading plant-based meat makers, The Vegetarian Butcher was established in 2007 by Jaap Korteweg – a ninth-generation livestock farmer – and politician Niko Koffeman. In 2016, it co-produced a line of vegetarian meatballs with Unilever under the Unox soup brand, and was purchased by the CPG behemoth two years later as it looked to capitalise on the boom in meat-free eating.

The Vegetarian Butcher’s products are available in 55 countries and over 40,000 retail locations, as well as restaurants and chains like Burger King and Subway. According to Unilever – which spent over £8M on a marketing push for the brand in 2019 – the plant-based meat maker has delivered “strong double-digit growth on average” since the acquisition, although Reuters reported that it only records around €50M in annual sales and is loss-making.

The Vegetarian Butcher’s chilled and frozen products require a “distinct supply chain and sourcing model”, which made it “less scalable” within Unilever’s broader portfolio, the group said. It added that the plant-based business’s innovations were driven by a “unique set of technological and R&D capabilities” that differed significantly from the needs of its broader product range.

“We are very excited for The Vegetarian Butcher to be joining forces with Vivera, as it will bring the opportunity to combine our strengths and deliver even greater value to our partners and our consumers,” said The Vegetarian Butcher CEO Rutger Rozendaal.

Vivera is one of Europe’s oldest and largest vegan meat producers, having been around since 1990. It was initially part of the Enkco Foodgroup, whose flagship brand was a namesake meat maker. But the group sold the Enkco business to focus solely on the plant-based enterprise in 2017, paving the way for strong growth. This led JBS to acquire Vivera in 2021.

Today, Vivera’s products are available in over 27,000 supermarket stores across 25 European countries. Its retail and private-label portfolio and in-house technologies are “complementary” to The Vegetarian Butcher, the firm said.

“We join forces to create a great purpose-driven company with many talented and highly motivated people. Acceleration of the protein transition is more important than ever and we look forward to inspiring more people to eat more plant-based,” said Vivera CEO Willem van Weede.

The Vegetarian Butcher eyes success as Unilever shakeup continues

Change has been fast afoot at Unilever in recent months. The group has of late begun demerging its ice cream units in India and Indonesia, and will list global brands like Magnum and Ben & Jerry’s on public markets this year. The latter is in a spat with its parent company over the ouster of CEO David Stever last month, with Unilever accused of removing the executive over his political activism.

The CPG company is also looking to sell a number of its Dutch food brands, including Unox and Conimex. Speculation about the future of brands like Colman’s, Marmite, and Pot Noodle has been rampant since the departure of CEO Hein Schumacher, who only took over in July 2023 and masterminded the GAP2030 strategy focused on “doing fewer things, better and with greater impact”.

Schumacher, who has been replaced by CFO Fernando Fernandez, said the board was keen to “step up the pace of our strategy execution and realise swift value creation underscored by a change in leadership”.

Unilever has additionally scaled back a number of its key climate goals, a break from its reputation as one of the world’s ESG leaders. The company recorded a 1.9% hike in turnover in 2024, reaching €60.8B. Its power brands led the way with sales growth of 5.3%. Meanwhile, the group’s food business made up 22% of its 2024 revenue. At €13.4B, this was second only to the personal care segment.

“Market growth, which slowed throughout 2024, is expected to remain soft in the first half of 2025,” Schumacher said last month. “The steps we have taken in 2024, including the launch of our refreshed GAP2030 strategy, further reinvestment in our brands and strong innovation pipelines leave us better positioned to deliver on our ambitions in the years ahead.”

There had been scepticism about Unilever’s ability to find buyers for The Vegetarian Butcher at the right price, and some had (correctly) suggested it could appeal to trade buyers like meat producers looking to diversify into plant-based alternatives.

“This marks a significant step towards becoming one of the largest and most influential companies in the plant-based industry, making us uniquely positioned towards further accelerating the global shift to tasty and healthy plant-based solutions,” said Rozendaal.

The deal comes amid a downturn in investment in plant-based food (by 75% in 2024) and faltering sales, resulting in a number of mergers and acquisitions in the past year, including Ahimsa Companies’s takeover of Wicked Kitchen, Simulate, and Blackbird Foods, the separate deals for ready meal brand Allplants by Deliciously Ella’s founders and Grubby, and Misha’s Inc’s purchase of vegan cheese producer Vertage, among others.