Meet an increasingly visible player in the environmental sustainability space: cultivated meat.
Cultivated meat is real meat that’s grown in a lab instead of on a farm. Cells are extracted from live animals and then technology replicates the natural cell growth process. The end result is genuine meat that does not require harming or slaughtering animals. This method is faster and more sustainable than farming livestock—a practice often criticized for its large environmental footprint and its cruelty to animals.
While several cultivated meat brands have recently scored FDA approval for their products, companies in this space face fierce competition for funding.
Meatable, a Netherlands-based company, announced this August that it secured $35 million in new investments, bringing its total funding to $95 million. This is the largest investment a company in the cultivated meat space has received in recent months.
Naturally, we wanted to know: What is Meatable doing right?
A quick visit to the company’s website offered some clarity—the storytelling is spot on. Once you arrive on the home page, Meatable feeds you bite-size pieces of text and visuals with each scroll, keeping the momentum going. I found myself fully immersed in the story and kept scrolling until I reached its conclusion.
In short, Meatable took me through a textbook—or should I say storybook—example of a skillfully executed brand story.
A well-crafted brand story demonstrates your company’s value. It helps you build real connections with your audience and compels them to get on board. On the other hand, a vague or disjointed brand story can be damaging. It may leave potential investors or customers with the impression that your company is cookie-cutter, disorganized, or just, well, not that exciting.
Here are the key elements of a strong brand story and how to nail each one:
Brand Story Element #1: The Premise
The premise sets the scene for the story that’s about to unfold. It should address the who and what of your brand’s audience. Who is your market and what is their current situation?
Here’s Meatable’s premise: The world craves meat. And that’s completely understandable. Meat is delicious. “At Meatable, we love meat. We see it as an essential part of a balanced diet,” touts Meatable’s website.
A strong premise establishes an immediate connection with your audience and gives an entry point into a story that is relevant to them. Let your reader know you get them, you’re on their side, and you have their best interest in mind.
The world has an appetite for meat. We get it. We do too.
Brand Story Element #2: The Conflict
Every great story has conflict. It’s what builds suspense and intrigue—capturing the reader’s attention and getting them invested in the outcome. In today’s world, attention is a hot commodity. With a seemingly endless slew of content to scroll through, it’s challenging to create content that gets a reader to stop scrolling and pay attention. Brands with a talent for whipping up a heaping dose of intriguing conflict are the ones that stand a chance.
In Meatable’s case, the conflict comes from the world’s main source of meat procurement and its repercussions.
Enter the villain: Industrial Farming.
Industrial Farming is a really bad guy. First of all, as Meatable’s website tells us, he’s responsible for “15% of all GHG emissions and is a major driver of global deforestation.”
He guzzles up our water—“It takes 1,799 gallons of water to produce just 1lb of beef.”
And finally, he’s cruel to the adorable animals pictured throughout Meatable’s site—housing them in inhumane conditions, stuffing them full of antibiotics, and slaughtering them mercilessly.
As readers, we’re faced with a dilemma. Do we swear off meat altogether to stop the evils of Industrial Farming? Well….no. As the premise told us, we love meat. It’s an essential part of a balanced diet. Plus, it simply tastes better than all those plant-based substitutes. Hence, our conflict.
Employing a villain as the catalyst of conflict in your brand story is a great way to create a sense of closeness between readers and your brand–united against a common source of evil. And, of course, wherever there’s a villain, there’s bound to be a hero—which brings us to….
Brand Story Element #3: The Resolution
Now that you’ve elicited an emotional investment from your reader, it’s important to provide a payoff. Your brand story should present a solution to your conflict, positioning your reader as the hero of the story.
In Meatable’s story, if the reader chooses Meatable products, they become the hero—taking a stand against Industrial Farming, protecting the environment, and consuming delicious, real meat they already know they love. As Meatable quips, it’s “change without compromise, the best of both worlds.”
But Meatable’s resolution doesn’t just solve the reader’s dilemma. It goes above and beyond, presenting a visionary goal for a new reality through its copy and visuals.
For our planet: Lush green fields, thriving forests, happy cows, and gleeful pigs enjoying their “retirement.”
And for us: A hospitable climate, a “clean conscience,” and delicious real meat that’s consequence-free.
Presenting an actionable, visionary goal as part of your resolution is the final step toward inspiring readers to get on board. It gives them a chance not only to solve their own problems but to be part of something larger than themselves.
Ready to tell your story?
Setting an enticing scene, concocting captivating conflict, and crafting a resolution guaranteed to get customers onboard takes top-notch strategic thinking and a masterful command of language. Meet your partner in words.
With a collaborative team of elite writers, a 35-point quality control process, and a centralized strategic approach, MarketSmiths has developed a discipline that produces consistent, on-brand content for our clients across diverse industries and formats. Contact the MarketSmiths team to get started today.
