VFC (company) facts for kids
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| Private company | |
| Industry | Vegan cuisine |
| Founded | December 2020 |
| Founders | Matthew Glover, Adam Lyons |
| Headquarters | North Yorkshire, United Kingdom |
| Products | Meat analogue |
VFC Foods is a British company that makes tasty vegan food. It started selling its products in December 2020. The name VFC stands for "Vegan Fried Chicken." It was founded by two people, Matthew Glover and Adam Lyons, in North Yorkshire, England. This company focuses on making food that looks and tastes like fried chicken, but it's all made from plants! Matthew Glover is also famous for helping to start the Veganuary movement, which encourages people to try being vegan for January. He uses his experience to help promote VFC.
VFC grew very fast in its first year. It started as an online shop in York and quickly began selling its products in other countries. The animal rights group PETA even gave VFC an award for being the "Best Vegan Chicken."
How VFC Foods Started
VFC makes its food using ingredients from plants, like wheat protein. These ingredients help create foods that taste and feel like fried chicken. The products are covered in a crispy coating made from cornflakes. VFC means "vegan fried chick*n." The company was started by Matthew Glover and Adam Lyons in York, United Kingdom. Matthew Glover is a businessman and an activist for veganism. He and his wife helped create the Veganuary movement in 2014. Adam Lyons is a chef and runs restaurants.
The idea for VFC came about when Matthew Glover visited Adam Lyons' restaurant, Source. Matthew tried the vegan fried chicken there and loved it so much that he wanted more people to try it too! Adam Lyons had also visited a chicken farm, which made him want to focus on vegan food and start this business. Their goal was also to show a different way of producing food, as a kind of protest against large-scale chicken farms. Matthew Glover once said that VFC is "where food meets activism." VFC is one of several vegan brands that have started in the Yorkshire area, helping the region become known for its meat-free food.
Growing the VFC Brand
Matthew Glover and Adam Lyons worked with a company called Born Ugly to create the VFC brand. They wanted their brand to show that "junk food" can be good for you and the planet. This was a new idea because many food companies try to seem very serious. VFC's packaging has cool graffiti-style art and messages that support veganism. Their main products are vegan chicken fillets, vegan chicken bites, and vegan popcorn chicken. At first, you could only buy these products online from their website.
VFC hired a sales director to help them get their products into British supermarkets. In their very first month, VFC sold products worth £48,000! They even ran out of stock because so many people wanted to buy their food. In early 2021, the company received £2.5 million in investments from groups like Matthew Glover's own Veg Capital. In October 2021, VFC made a big deal with the British supermarket Tesco to sell their products there. That same month, VFC won the "Best Vegan Chicken" award at the 2021 PETA Vegan Food Awards.
VFC Around the World
VFC quickly started selling its products in other countries. In its first year, VFC began selling in Spain and the Netherlands. In September 2021, VFC announced that they would also be launching their products in the United States. Matthew Glover also shared that VFC had received interest from businesses in 50 other countries! In December 2021, VFC was a main exhibitor at the Plant Based World Expo in New York City.
Activism and Publicity
VFC is well-known for its support of animal rights and for its clever ways of getting attention. The brand often shares funny and bold messages on social media. They worked with actor Peter Egan to secretly film conditions at a chicken farm in Shropshire, showing what it was like there. VFC has also promised to fight back against people who post mean comments about vegans online. Matthew Glover has said that talking to these "trolls" actually helped the brand become more famous. Another fun thing VFC did to get attention was to only follow one account on Instagram: the fast food chicken brand KFC!
In 2021, the company decided to stop using the phrase "plant-based" in its advertising. Instead, they chose to focus only on the word "vegan."
In 2023, VFC bought another company called Meatless Farm. Products from Meatless Farm will now be sold again in Asda supermarkets.
