MyBacon’s Winning Week
A recap of our first experience at Natural Products Expo West, 2024.
MyForest Foods’ booth set-up at Natural Products Expo West. The front panels of the booth were fully composable and made from mycelium!
We’re fresh off the plane from the West Coast after an incredible week at New Hope Media’s Natural Products Expo West. This industry trade-show is too big to describe! Thousands of Natural Product Industry brands, tens of thousands of attendees… and a LOT of sampling to enjoy.
With MyBacon’s availability steadily expanding across the Northeast, our mighty little company has hit the scale needed to make this Expo a shining moment! We’re happy to share that we’ve just announced new distribution partners: UNFI and KeHe!
AN ALL-SENSORY EXPERIENCE
The thing about MyBacon is—there’s nothing like the first bite. Over three days, we dished out over 7,500 samples to industry buyers, retailers, influencers, investors, and all-around natural food heroes. Watching those first-bite reactions never gets old.
A slab of our mycelium on display at our booth at Natural Products Expo West
In addition to tasting MyBacon, we also allowed visitors to touch mycelium! We shipped large pieces of raw mycelium to the Expo so folks could experience its whole-cut nature firsthand.
TROPHY MOMENTS!
The MyForest Foods team proudly posing with our NEXTY award for a “Prom Photo”
Each year, Expo West holds a prestigious awards ceremony: The NEXTY Awards. Entrants are judged against “The Three I’s,” a.k.a, Integrity, Ingenuity, and Innovation. With our brand’s purpose, we knew we had a good chance!
Over 1,500 entrants competed in 34 categories this year to take home the title. MyBacon was a “Best Vegan Product” finalist; so exciting!
Up against a slew of amazing brands, the evening was a nail-biter. When our name was called, there aren’t words to describe the elation! We’ve worked so hard to bring this entirely new food to market. Achieving a NEXTY was felt to the core.
If the NEXTY award wasn’t exciting enough, the acclaimed VegNews stopped by our booth the very next day with a surprise: MyBacon won their “Best in Show” award! This honor is given to the 12 best new vegan products of the Expo, and it’s even more validation that we’re truly onto something here!
While we like to think of MyBacon as “everybody’s bacon,” there’s no doubt about it; in terms of vegan-friendly products, our farm-grown, organic mycelium bacon is like nothing else on the market.
THE HIGHLIGHTS CONTINUE
We loved this recap from USA Today, Thank you to Amber Gibson for including us in this great roundup!
Our friends at the Green Queen were so kind to include us in their Expo “Top 10” list, while The Food Institute shared the love through their list of 8 Truly Innovative Products.
New Hope Media made our week with this great article about our mission to feed the future with mycelium.
Last but not least, we loved meeting influencers! Here’s a shout-out to just a few of our dear new friends and connections:
IS MyBACON NEAR YOU?
With the announcement of widened distribution—which comes on the heels of our Whole Foods Market debut—MyBacon is getting out there in the world! While we’re primarily available in the Northeast, keep watch on our store locator because new retailers are being added by the day.
Sign up for our newsletter and follow us on Instagram to stay in touch! Thanks again for your support, cheers, and interest in our farm-grown, meatless mycelium!
