to be heard. They want to fuel a fair and sustainable food system. They get their information from alternative media and grassroots systems. Food sovereignty, Indigenous water rights, regenerative practices, immigrant labor rights — those are the kinds of issues and topics that are important to them. They skew slightly female and work primarily in nonprofits, NGOs, urban farming, jour-nalism. They’re predominantly white, 15% African-American, 17% Hispanic. They are mostly lower to middle class, mostly single and couples without chil-dren, largely urban and rural. You won’t find them in the suburbs. You will find about 20% of them are boomers. The next group is the authenticity seeker. They’re 14% of the population, 18% share of voice. For them, truth is unfiltered, real and first-hand. They want that authentic first-hand infor-mation, either through social media or through personal experience. It has to be free from corporate manipulation. They want local, holistic experiences of food production and food consumption. They, too, skew slightly female, middle class, and mostly singles and couples without children. Like the progressive disruptor, the authenticity seeker is largely urban and rural, not suburban dwellers, and predominantly white. Now, the rationalist is a group that, historically, we really like in food and agriculture because they are grounded in science and research reason. They want to look for information. They want to see what’s behind your conclusions. They’re 19% of the population, 15% share of voice. It’s important to understand they will avoid sensationalism or politicized narratives so if you want to scare them about something, you will turn them off. They understand the need for a more industrialized food system to provide what we need in ways that help us preserve the environment. They are not opposed to it, they simply want to see the science behind it. They’re 54% male, 46% female, middle class and above, largely urban and suburban. They are 65% white, 10% African-American, 13% Hispanic. This next group is new, and I think it really reflects what we’ve seen in terms of the anxiety and the confusion that we’ve talked about before: The comfort seeker. They are 43% of the population. When we did this research in 2017, this cohort did not exist. So what we’ve seen is that rise in anxiety and confusion. They’re looking for reassurance. They 26 Alt-Meat August 2025
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