為學校供應健康午餐的初創公司Revolution Foods正在繼續不斷占領超市。

本月早些時候，該公司在加利福尼亞州的奧克蘭推出了一系列所謂的“成品晚餐”或“速食”產品【類似于“漢堡助手”（Hamburger Helper）】。購買這種產品的顧客可以享用加有香料和“晚餐英雄”（Dinner Hero）套裝中配有的醬汁的全谷物食品，再加上一磅自己另外購買的蛋白質。與此同時，公司還推出了“早餐英雄”（Breakfast Hero）系列的預調煎餅面糊。

Revolution Foods的這一系列新產品，是為了與那些端坐于食品商店貨架正中，缺乏創新的傳統包裝食品展開競爭。該公司已經推出了名為“午餐包裹”（Lunch Bundles）的系列午餐，與卡夫亨氏公司（Kraft Heinz）的“方便午餐”（Lunchables）競爭，另外還有“一杯裝”（In a Cup）的面條食品。

這家食品公司得到了史蒂夫·凱斯的投資基金Revolution Growth（名字相似只是巧合）的支持。凱斯表示：“我兒時流行的許多品牌如今仍然很受歡迎。而當下，一些新的品牌和公司已經開始挑戰這些“大食品公司”了。”在業內，“大食品公司”往往指那些傳統的包裝消費食品公司，隨著消費者傾向于購買更健康、加工更少的食品，這些老牌公司遭遇了困難。

Revolution Foods也將目光投向了那些停滯不前的食品領域。公司的共同創始人和首席影響官柯爾斯頓·薩恩斯·托比表示：“我們要挺進食品商店業績下滑的領域。那些領域的解決方案多年來沒有變化，如今已經陳腐不堪。”

托比和她的共同創始人和公司的首席執行官克里斯汀·谷魯斯·里奇蒙德認為，Revolution Food的優勢來自不含人工原料的“真正原料”生產的營養食品，這是“大食品”公司正在倉促效仿的。例如，公司的“早餐英雄”系列產品，就是用全脂牛奶和真正的雞蛋制造的。

2006年起，Revolution Foods開始為孩子們提供營養廉價的學校午餐，如今，他們每周會給14個州提供200萬份學校餐。里奇蒙德表示：“我們發現了一個巨大的機遇，能夠極大地改變我們給孩子提供食物的方式。”

在初期，家長們問Revolution Foods如何在放學后把這些食品帶回家，再加上零售商有興趣吸引“有使命感的品牌進駐”，這促使公司拓展了業務范圍。他們建立了使命基金，將銷售包裝食品的總銷售額的1%捐給需要幫助的學校。

公司從每日為孩子們提供午餐中總結經驗，設計讓消費者青睞的產品。例如，他們推出“一杯裝”面條產品，就是因為他們發現向孩子們提供的十種最熱門食品中，有三種都是面條類的。

目前，包裝消費食品只占Revolution收入中很小的一部分，今年他們的總收入預計將達到1.5億美元。不過該公司的食品已經進入了44個州的4,500家食品雜貨店。（財富中文網）

譯者：嚴匡正

Healthy school lunch provider Revolution Foods is continuing its march down the supermarket aisle.

Earlier this month the Oakland, Calif., company rolled out a line of what’s known in the food industry as “prepared dinner mixes” or “speed scratch” kits (think Hamburger Helper). In this case, customers take the whole grain, spice blend, and sauce that are provided as part of the “Dinner Hero” kit, and add a pound of protein that they buy separately. The company also rolled out a “Breakfast Hero” line of pre-mixed pancake batters at the same time.

The new products join a growing list of goods from Revolution Foods that are intended to compete with traditional packaged foods categories—those staples that tend to sit in the middle of the grocery store—that have not seen much innovation. The company already has a line of packaged lunch meals called Lunch Bundles, which competes with Kraft Heinz’s KHC 1.32% Lunchables, as well as an “In a Cup” product, which are noodle-based meals.

“A lot of the brands that were popular when I was a kid are still popular today,” said Steve Case, whose investment fund Revolution Growth (no relation) has a stake in the startup. “There’s a new portfolio of brands and companies that are really taking on what some have called Big Food.” Big Food–the sector’s shorthand for classic consumer packaged food companies–have suffered as consumers have shifted their dollars toward products they believe are healthier and less processed.

Revolution is also targeting categories that have experienced stagnant growth. “We’re going into a category in the grocery store that’s been declining,” says Kirsten Saenz Tobey, Revolution Foods co-founder and chief impact officer. “The solutions that have been in that category for many, many years are kind of stale at this point.”

Tobey and her co-founder and company CEO Kristin Groos Richmond believe Revolution Food’s edge will comes from a focus on nutritious products made with “real ingredients” that are free of artificial ingredients that Big Food companies are scrambling to remove from their products. Its Breakfast Hero line, for example, is made with whole milk and real eggs.

The company started in 2006 as a provider of nutritious, affordable school lunches to kids and now serves 2 million schools meals every week in 14 states. “We saw a huge opportunity to dramatically transform the way we feed kids,” Richmond says.

But early on Revolution’s co-founders started getting questions from parents about how they could take the company’s meals home at the end of the school day. That, coupled with calls from retailers interested in getting “mission-driven brands in the grocery store,” led them to branch out. The company has built on its purpose-driven roots by putting 1% of all its sales from its consumer packaged food items into a grant fund that goes to schools in need.

The company uses the insights its garners from serving kids lunch every day to design the products that end up in consumers’ shopping bags. Its “In a Cup” noodle line, for example, came about after realizing that three of the top 10 foods the company was serving to kids were noodle based.

Currently the consumer packaged foods part of Revolution’s business makes up a small percentage of its revenue, which is set to hit $150 million this year. But its products are already in 4,500 grocery stores in 44 states.