In an interview with Elysabeth Alfano on the Plantbased Business Hour, Principal of HappyCow, Ken Spector, shares breaking, global vegan restaurant trends during Covid-19 and the explosion of vegan options all across the world, revealing that while mainstream foodservice is failing, there has in fact been an increase in vegan restaurants since the Pandemic.
Ken’s research focused on how Covid-19 has affected restaurants and he found that while some restaurants had to close their doors, more new vegan venues have opened: In the United States, 88 vegan venues closed, but 99 were added. In the UK, 25 closed, but 46 were opened. In total, 413 vegan venues closed, but 517 opened. 104 more vegan venues are now on HappyCow since the start of Covid-19.
“About a third of the countries, the more vegancentric countries, have a net loss of vegan restaurants now due to closures versus openings, but two thirds have a greater number of additions than vegan restaurants and stores that have closed,” Ken told Elysabeth.
He adds, “These were purely vegan restaurants. We’re not even talking yet about vegan options. That is exploding!” Also according to Ken, Germany has now become the country exporting the most vegan products around the world. As we reported, A recent study by Forsa on the eating habits of Germans, showed that meat consumption in the country continues to decline and this decline is increasingly taking place amongst males. Only 26% of those surveyed eat meat every day, whereas this was the case for 34% surveyed in 2015.
