Dead Meat
The hype on Beyond Meat was beyond reason. Note to investors: It's mashed peas.
“In the beginning there was nothing and God said ‘Let there be light’, and there was still nothing but everybody could see it.” – Dave Thomas
Never in history did so many people get so excited about peas. Mash them into a burger patty with a little potato starch, claim you’re disrupting the meat industry, launch an initial public stock offering, and part hungry fools from their money.
Beyond Meat went public in May 2019 at $25 a share and by July of that year its stock exploded to an intraday high of nearly $234 a share.
Those privileged enough to get in on the action enjoyed the biggest IPO pop since 2000 – supercharged with endorsements and investments from and athletes and celebrities, including Shaquille O’Neal, Leonardo DiCaprio, Kim Kardashian and Snoop Dogg.
Today, Beyond Meat is trading for $1.40 in one of the biggest IPO blunders of all time
Beyond Meat founder and CEO Ethan Brown talked about saving the planet by switching from cows, pigs and chickens to highly processed pea burgers. He didn’t call them pea burgers, though. It was more complex than that.
Here’s the mansplaining techno-babble Brown gave to Time in 2021:
