How Will Marketing Help Us Eat Lab Meat and Insects?

Sometimes I salivate when I see cows. It’s not something I’m proud of. It’s also not something I beat myself up about. In the moment I’m even a bit pleased that I don’t experience a sharp disconnect between the living animal and the meat I enjoy so, so much. Eating meat is the most questionably immoral thing I do with utter relish. A few months ago after salivating at the sight of those gentle, chunky, peaceful animals augmenting a New Braintree pasture I told myself, "Who are my salivary glands to ignore a mob of ribeye memories?"

And who will we be to ignore manufactured meat in the future? After all, caveats accounted for, fewer animals are harmed and it may even be better for the environment. In a recent poll, 64% of a US sample said they were willing to at least try lab meat, sometimes called in-vitro meat (IVM) or cultured meat. However, the majority said they wouldn't eat it on a regular basis. Some will not just ignore lab meat they'll try to forget they ever heard about it, or they’ll rail against it out of revulsion. For others the main concerns will be price and taste. The most common objections in the poll extended from the sense that cultured meat is "unnatural" and “unappealing.”

Together these reactions represent a not entirely hopeless challenge for marketers of IVM in the future. Participants in the poll largely acknowledged potential benefits so persuasion in the long-term could work out as long as brands make good on the set of promises those benefits are folded into. Cultured meat will also have to make a stellar first impression on the many people who are willing to try it, but doubt they'll make a habit of purchasing it. 

Insect products face a similar challenge. Entomophagy is the human use of insects for food, an old practice prevalent today in several parts of the world that people like Ben Reade want to renew and popularize. Reade was one of the leaders of the Nordic Food Lab's "insect deliciousness" project. The project is... ongoing; also promising and, for my money, successful. While farming bugs could mean more food for more people, Reade is careful not to make empty promises about, say, solving food security. "Insects can be a vehicle for something," he says. "But it has to be recognized that it's not the insects themselves that are going to make it sustainable. It's the humans." Enter marketing.

I say bring on the bugs. Let me meet some lab meat. A targeted marketing campaign I'd enjoy is one that uses some humor to acknowledge me as an early adopter. I'd want it to help me feel even more comfortable with my consumption. I'd want it to inspire me to become the kind of advocate that doesn't gross people out. 

For every audience, marketers will have to be transparent about the actual impact of widespread entomophagy and IVM. It’s going to take an extra special amount of brand authenticity and consumer trust to make bugs or lab meat a household staple.

Also important will be online access to tried and true recipes rated by individuals. Culinary school and cooking almost everyday has humbled me as much as it’s grown my confidence. That combination of humility and confidence is irrigated by my gratitude for the support and stimulation I get from recipe sites and online communities. (By the way, an app like Paprika makes all that information manageable and easy to integrate into everyday life.) When I’m brave enough to make a meal out of beetles it’ll be because I’ve learned from someone out there who already did the truly pioneering work of messing it up over and over. The internet can be great for brands that need to overcome a “yuck factor.” Credible, guiding reassurances have never been more accessible and organized.

I have tremendous faith in technology. I’m an optimistic guy, but when it comes to technology my optimism feeds into fervor. Technology is refined by our skepticism and advanced through our demand for the coordination and augmentation of our desires. Technology increases options, freedoms, choices and possibilities. In this way, technology furthers our search for and our creation of meaning. 

Part of what sustains my faith in technology is marketing's power to dissolve reservations and squeamishness. If we're eating cultured meat and insects in the future it'll be because marketing addressed our skepticism. 

Maybe one day I'll salivate at the sight of a petrie dish, or an anthill in a New Braintree pasture. I hope so.