Is the Alternative Meats Era Over? Why Are Americans So Lonely? and Should I Practice Vulnerability at Work?

Scott advises a listener in the alternative meats industry who is wondering if the bubble has burst. He then answers a question about car dependency in the U. S. and how it relates to loneliness. He wraps up with his thoughts on whether demonstrating vulnerability at work is inappropriate. Music: https://www.davidcuttermusic.com / @dcuttermusic Subscribe to No Mercy / No Malice Buy "The Algebra of Wealth," out now. Follow the podcast across socials @profgpod: Instagram Threads X Reddit Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Scott Galloway?

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• 0:48Speaker 01

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• 1:27Scott Galloway?

  Welcome to the Prof G Pod's Office Hours. This is the part of the show where we answer your questions about business, big tech, entrepreneurship, and whatever else is on your mind. If you'd like to submit a question, please email a voice recording to [email protected]. Again, that's [email protected]. First question.

• 1:45Speaker 02

  Hey Scott, I'm Adam. I run a venture-backed, plant-based dumpling company in San Francisco. And yeah, every time I say that, I take stock of what I have and I count my blessings. Anyways, we're a part of the alternative meat industry in which we make delicious alternatives to animal meat. And the sector ranges from products made of such things as plants, fungi, or even cells. As a scientist in the sector for a while, we've been going through some turbulent times. As an industry, we fell off the hype cycle, and a lot of brands are struggling to recover. Therefore, a lot of branding and strategy has kind of gone all over the place with, in my opinion, little thoughtfulness. With increasing pressure from conventional animal meat and a product that's generally more expensive and opinionated on taste compared to its conventional counterpart, if you were to take the reins on designing branding and strategy for an alternative

• 2:30Speaker 02

  meat company, what do you think they should focus on? With meat alternatives taking just a small market share of conventional meat, how do we beat big meat? Double entendre aside, I was inspired to write this question because you mentioned cutting back on beef. Also, have been listening to your podcast since the WeWork days and my dad and I argue about your hot takes all the time. Thank you for your work.

• 2:50Scott Galloway?

  A really thoughtful question, Adam, from San Francisco. So when you had your first sentence, "I run a venture-backed, plant-based dumpling company in San Francisco," my first thought, you then said in your second sentence, you said, "I take stock of what I have and count my blessings." You run a venture-backed, plant-based dumpling company. Okay. I don't think that would happen for you in Ecuador. I don't think there's any way that would happen for you even in Singapore. Maybe Singapore. I don't know. It's just, it's great to be, and I think we lose sight of this, and it appears you haven't, but I think one of the things that really bothers me about the tech bro community, if you will, is they conflate luck with talent. Anyways, good for you.

• 3:33Scott Galloway?

  Okay, so just some data. During the pandemic, more people bought alternative meat products due to health concerns, environmental reasons, and meat shortages. Since sales have plummeted, an expert suggests that plant-based bubble has burst. Beyond Meat, for example, in 2022, reported a 9.8% decrease in revenue. Gross profit was a loss of 23.7 million and gross margin of negative 5.7% of net revenues. According to The Good Food Institute, plant-based beef is twice as expensive as regular beef and four times the cost of chicken on store shelves. Due to high prices, investment in these alternatives fell by 78% last year. So branding.

• 4:16Scott Galloway?

  Quite frankly, boss, I think you have an elegant brand, like good packaging, a nice website, and to be blunt, I don't think it matters. I think you're in a nuclear winter and you go, I think you cut costs like crazy. I can tell if I was on your board, I'd be like, lay off 60% of my staff, cut my burn and get through this nuclear winter. Because... I would bet somewhere between 50 and 80% of alternative meat companies go away in the next 24 months because they assumed that it was going to be the next big thing. And it might be, but it's next is the dangerous word. When is next going to happen? And the folks that survive, you got to assume this is going to work, that alternative meats are going to have, going to be a viable part of our food ecosystem. All right. So you're

• 4:59Scott Galloway?

  bought into that. Let's just assume that's a given. You're going to have to get to the other side. And the other side, there's going to be a valley of death. It's got to be near impossible to raise money right now. So you want to, quite frankly, just hunker down. I wouldn't focus on the sustainability of it. I'd focus on the taste of it and I would not spend much money on marketing at all. And I'd keep my prices as low as I could. And I would just try and extend my runway as long as possible and execute well, have really good relationships with my partners, do a lot of sampling, a lot of earned media, try and write a lot, a lot of thought leadership. I would be really scrappy. I would not spend a lot of time on traditional branding here because I would be throwing nickels around like they're manhole covers because the bad news is, I think this ecosystem is going

• 5:43Scott Galloway?

  to lose a ton of players. The good news is, is that when the market comes back, it should be champagne and cocaine for alternative beef, whatever that would be, because there'll be just much fewer players. And if you can survive, you're going to come out the other end really, really robustly. Just on a personal note, I absolutely love beef. I could eat beef three times a day. I could wake up and eat bacon, then have a bacon sandwich and then have steak with, you know, carpaccio. And if they had meat desserts, I'd probably, I, the dog is big on meat. I like meat. And also, I think it's, I think there's a lot of evidence that it's not that bad for you. Where I am starting to question my beef intake is TikTok. I'm on TikTok and I see this bull.

• 6:30Scott Galloway?

  Playing with this rancher where he takes the barrel and he bounces the barrel towards the rancher and the rancher and the bull like this two ton animal sits there jumping its legs, waiting for the rancher to throw the barrel so he can retrieve it for him. And I immediately think of my, my Great Dane Leia. And I just impossible for me to ignore the fact that these are mammals with big brains, very emotional, that suckle their young, they give live birth and want to be around other beings and are probably at their core, you know, kind, wonderful beings. And when you have the unfortunate experience of learning anything about the industrial food production business, what

• 7:15Scott Galloway?

  we do to these animals is I don't, it's in humans, the wrong word, because we would never treat humans this way. It's just totally amoral, not even, no, it's not amoral, it's immoral. And it's starting to weigh on me for the first time. There's more birds in captivity than birds in the wild because of chickens and the way they raise veal. I mean, it really is, we should hope there's not a hell. Because if there is a hell, or even if there is a heaven, and we have to reconcile our activities with animals, it's going to be pretty fucking ugly. A long-winded way of saying, I think it's important what you're doing. I think we should all be thinking about plant-based alternative calories. If for anything, if I come at it from a humanity standpoint, or just, you know, having dogs

• 7:57Scott Galloway?

  has just changed my outlook on the industrial food complex. As it relates to you, boss, you're in survival mode. This industry is going to work, it's going to grow, and you want to be one of the survivors and have your sails up, or at least have your, your sails intact, such that when the winds come back, you're ready. It's not aspirational. Branding is not going to save you right here. This is about survival. Question number two.

• 8:21Speaker 03

  I was curious if you have any thoughts regarding car dependency in the US and how it relates to the death of third spaces. Outside of living in the downtowns of our biggest cities, reliable public transportation in walkable communities can be few and far between. As someone who has well traveled and has lived abroad, I'm sure you've been exposed to what life can be like when communities are not dependent on using a car. In a world where we are feeling increasingly isolated, it can often feel like reliance on cars contributes to that. Kids don't play in the streets, people can't walk around and pop into a cafe or a pub. Do you have any thoughts on car dependency and how it relates to our communities?

• 9:01Scott Galloway?

  It's a really interesting question, so, um, thank you anonymous. The US is really car reliant, more so than most countries because the automobile industry and the rubber industry basically got in the way of all public infrastructure such that we would buy more cars and more tires. Um, census data shows that thirty seven percent of US households have access to two vehicles. In twenty twenty-two, only eight point three percent of households were without a vehicle, down from eight point seven percent in twenty eighteen. Uh, things are changing though, so just to go back, I had no social life. When I turned, the day I turned sixteen, I got a car. Um, I went and got my driver's license, my mom gave me her Opel Manta. I mean, it was a really nice moment for me, this lime green Opel Manta, it was the nicest thing I'd ever received.

• 9:44Scott Galloway?

  And she used to come home and I'd go down to the garage when I was fifteen and she'd give me driver's lessons in the garage. Anyways, I was totally focused on having a car. My kids have no desire to have a car, and for the first time in my life, I don't have a car. I don't think this is the problem. I don't think, well, I mean, okay, there's some nuance. One of the things that's wonderful about London and I love about my son, my son will go to a sneaker convention with his friends and they take the tube and it's fantastic. And that wasn't available to me when I was a kid. However, I didn't have screens, so I wanted to get out of the house and I figured out a way to get out of the house. I used to take the RTD Route eighty-three along Wilshire Boulevard, which crawled along about forty-five minutes to get three miles to the beach and then take it back. That's not the problem. The problem isn't cars. As a matter of fact, kids don't want cars.

• 10:27Scott Galloway?

  Uber is amazing, there's cars, there's all sorts of ride hailing you can get around. I would argue that Uber, in concert with what little public infrastructure there is, solves most of those problems around getting somewhere. The problem is that people are having a reasonable facsimile of life, or think they can have a reasonable facsimile of life on a screen with algorithms. And I think that's really... The problem, a lot of people do agree with you around pollution. The two big puffs of carbon into the air have been, one, the suburbanization of America, which made us much more reliant on cars, and two, the industrialization of China, where we started using coal, or China started using coal to catch up economically. And supposedly obesity, one of the things that's led to obesity is that we spend an

• 11:09Scott Galloway?

  extra hour of car each day, it will result in a 6% greater chance of becoming obese. You don't want to be in your car a lot. As a matter of fact, one of the more interesting things I'm thinking about is this notion of what's the best place to send your kids to school? And there's a body of research showing that the best place to send your kids to school is the school that's closest, and then reinvesting that time they would spend on a commute, in time with family, more sleep, more studying, et cetera. Anyways, I think we are moving away from a car culture into a, you know, a car hailing, or car renting, or car leasing culture. Third spaces, we need investments in third spaces. We need more parks, more leagues, more nonprofits. I even think, I'm even thinking we need more religious institutions, just to give more

• 11:52Scott Galloway?

  opportunity for young people to be in the strangers, or in the company of strangers, you know, community colleges, whatever it is, just to get people out into third spaces, sort of the barbershop, if you will, walking, huge walk, outdoor walking malls. I think all of that stuff is incredibly important. I think this is a huge issue, but I don't think it's a lack of car, or lack of access to public transportation that's getting in the way here. I think it's a factor, but I think it's much more mendacious than that. And I think it's that kids, that we're letting them spend too much time on screens, and this notion that you don't need to go out and try and meet a woman, you can be on YouPorn, or that you don't need friends, you can go on Reddit or Discord. I think that's the problem.

• 12:37Scott Galloway?

  Let me put it this way, the phone has replaced the car, or public infrastructure, in terms of people trying to connect, and it's really, it's really terrible. But having said that, I absolutely love cars, first time I haven't owned one. But I don't think, I don't think, I think that our isolation is a function of something else, not, not the car. I actually think it's a good thing that young people, teenagers, don't drive. I was teaching my kid how to drive. Jesus Christ, that's scary. You go to the DMV, they give you a learner's permit, and they're like, off you go, young man. And then you put him in a car. And I'm not exaggerating. My son pulls up to make a left, and it's red, and he pulls out into the intersection to make a left. I'm like, what are you doing? It's like, well, you know, you have to make a stop on a red light, but then you can make

• 13:19Scott Galloway?

  a turn. I'm like, not on a left turn. And first off, only, that's only in California, on a right turn. And I'm panicked in the middle of this intersection. But that's how they learn. Anyways, don't know where I was going with that. But I think that loneliness, which is a crisis, is a function of our screens and not encouraging young people, not demanding that they get out of the house more. Bit of a word salad, bit of a word salad. Thank you for the question. We have one quick break before our final question. Stay with us. Support for the show comes from Superhuman. The pace of modern work can be relentless. You're getting a constant influx of messages from a ton of different apps. You haven't closed all your browser tabs in a year. Everything seems urgent, and staying on top of it all

• 14:04Scott Galloway?

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• 14:55Scott Galloway?

  Support for the show comes from Upwork. Trying to scale your business? At some point, you're probably going to hit a point where you need some help. Sometimes, the best way to break through that is bringing in the right talent at the right time. Upwork can help. Upwork is a one-stop platform where you can find, hire, and pay expert freelancers across more than 125 categories. Whether you need specialized skills for a single project or extra support to keep up with demand, it's easy to connect with experienced professionals, review their work, and find the right fit. You can move faster without taking on the commitment of full-time hires. And for businesses that need the very best talent, Upwork Business Plus provides access to the top 1% of freelancers on the platform. AI-powered matching connects you with qualified candidates in under six hours, cutting down the time spent searching.

• 15:39Scott Galloway?

  Upwork also takes care of contracts, payments, and other administrative tasks, so you can spend less time managing logistics and more time focused on what's next. Visit upwork.com/profg right now and post your job for free. That's upwork.com/profg to connect with top talent ready to help your business grow. That's U.P.W.O.R.K. com/profg. Upwork.com/profg.

• 16:06Scott Galloway?

  Support for the show comes from Vanta. As AI adoption grows, so does your company's security risks and requirements. New frameworks, audits, and vendors keep piling on, but your team isn't getting any bigger. Most compliance tools promise automation, but you're really stuck doing all the work by hand, chasing screenshots, validating controls, and playing catch-up when audit season comes around again. Vanta works differently. Their Agentic Trust platform is built to scale with you, not slow you down. With over 1,400 automated tests across 400-plus integrations, Vanta collects evidence and monitors your controls year-round, cutting your audit prep by 82%. Plus, you can access the Vanta agent everywhere you work, whether your team is in Vanta every day or living in tools including Claude or Cursor. Want proof?

• 16:51Scott Galloway?

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• 17:14Scott Galloway?

  Welcome back. Question number three.

• 17:16Speaker 04

  Hey, Prof G. My name is Connor. I'm from North Carolina and I'm a big fan of all your work. I listen to all the podcasts and I always walk away thinking about something differently than I did before. My question for you is about vulnerability. I've heard you talk on this pod and on other podcasts about the power of male vulnerability in the context of friends, family, and romantic relationships. I'd be curious to get your thoughts on how showing vulnerability translates to the workplace, particularly for managers and leaders. I've been in a leadership position at a tech company for a couple of years now, and I'm always looking to improve how I lead my teams. On one hand, I could see how a level of vulnerability has the potential to humanize managers and inspire their teams. But on the other hand, I can also see how too much vulnerability has the potential to undermine a leader's credibility.

• 17:59Speaker 04

  I'd love to hear your perspective on how, or even if, vulnerability can be a tool for managers and leaders.

• 18:05Scott Galloway?

  Connor, thanks for the question. So it's a spectrum. I think vulnerability is really important, but there's different levels of vulnerability and there's vulnerability that is appropriate to work and inappropriate. I don't think crying is... I think the downsides outweigh the upsides in a professional context. Unfortunately, especially if you're a woman. And that is, I remember when my firm, L2, was acquired by Gartner. I had a meeting with who was supposed to be my boss, but let's be honest, I was 10 times more important than this person. And they were upset. There was someone in the company who wanted out and I was helping him find a job. And she got upset and met with me and broke into tears. And I thought, I just didn't take her very seriously from that point forward. And if that sounds sexist, it is. And guess what? You're dealing with a sexist workplace.

• 18:51Scott Galloway?

  And I don't know. I think it's okay to be emotional when something moves you, but I don't think you want to show that kind of vulnerability at work. I just don't think it's appropriate. It makes people feel uncomfortable. It's hard to have a professional conversation.

• 19:04Scott Galloway?

  At the same time, there is vulnerability that's very powerful at work. One, admitting you're wrong. Oh, I did a bad job on this. I was wrong. Or I got, I'm finally, I still have a tough time doing that. I got this wrong. You know, I had a strategy for my online education firm that we get world-class professors and we get educational institutions on board. I was wrong. Educational institutions have, are fat and happy and don't want to work with disruptors. My strategy was just, it just didn't make any sense. And I, I'm finally at the point where I'm comfortable in a professional context saying, yeah, I screwed up here. Can we fix it? I think it's also important to, if you're a manager on a regular basis, say to someone, I got this wrong and I apologize. I think that kind of vulnerability is really important.

• 19:49Scott Galloway?

  No one expects you to be perfect. I think you want to be, I don't want to say guarded in terms of your emotions, but I think some of the emotional vulnerability you want to show in your relationships with your friends and your loved ones and your children, I think that should be mostly sequestered to a personal environment. My, my team sees a lot of my emotions on this podcast because it's, when I talk about this stuff and I reveal stuff about my past, I get very emotional. And to be blunt, it works because I'm talking to a lot of people and I'm trying to inform young men on how to be vulnerable in terms of their own emotions. And also, a lot of men are committing suicide at four times the rate of women. A lot of it is because men don't want to express vulnerability. So they get to a point where they just have an inability to share that they're struggling,

• 20:34Scott Galloway?

  feel like they're dealing with this alone and go to a very dark place and feel like everyone is so detached from their struggle that they don't even know where to start. And it takes them to a place of isolation and in real severe depression. So anyway, it's a lot here, but yeah, be vulnerable, admit your mistakes, apologize. But in terms of really being emotional, I think you want to have a much higher bar for demonstrating those emotions at work. It's work. It's a professional atmosphere.

• 21:04Scott Galloway?

  That's all for this episode. If you'd like to submit a question, please email a voice recording to [email protected]. Again, that's [email protected].

• 21:22Scott Galloway?

  This episode was produced by Caroline Shager. Jennifer Sanchez is our associate producer and Drew Burrows is our technical director. Thank you for listening to the Prof G Pod from the Vox Media Podcast Network. We will catch you on Saturday for No Mercy, No Malice, as read by George Hahn, and on Monday with our weekly market show.

• 21:40Speaker 05

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• 22:09Speaker 06

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