# Can Plant-Based Meat Be a Permanent Competitor to Animal Meat

Published 2021-10-05 · Updated 2026-03-19 · Food & Beverage on MarketScale
Canonical: https://www.marketscale.com/industries/food-beverage/can-plant-based-meat-be-a-permanent-competitor-to-animal-meat

> Key Points: The plant-based meat market is fast growing, but is still only a tiny fraction of total volume of meat sold in the United States. The real competition for plant-based meat isn’t other plant-based meat companies, but with animal meat. Plant-based meat competition strategies against regular meat could be similar to plant-based dairy…

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### Key Points:

- The plant-based meat market is fast growing, but is still only a tiny fraction of total volume of meat sold in the United States.
- The real competition for plant-based meat isn’t other plant-based meat companies, but with animal meat.
- Plant-based meat competition strategies against regular meat could be similar to plant-based dairy versus regular dairy.

### Commentary:

The plant based meat market is starting to become more [popular ](https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevebanker/2021/09/27/sustainability-and-plant-based-meat-supply-chains/?sh=73f264f62fd8)as more players are entering the game. According to a report from [Allied Research](https://www.alliedmarketresearch.com/press-release/global-meat-substitute-market.html), the industry is expected to increase to over $8 billion by 2026; that’s nearly double what its value was in 2017. We asked [Paul Shapiro](https://www.paul-shapiro.com/), CEO of the [Better Meat Company](https://www.bettermeat.co/), if those investments could create repeat results for the industry, and sourced him for insights on which competitive strategies will give alternative meat the cutting edge.

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