Minit Stop Moves from Beef to Impossible Burger

PC: Minit Stop

Hawai‘i convenience store chain Minit Stop announced today a decision to eliminate beef from its menu, instead replacing it entirely with Impossible Burger.

Minit Stop’s decision to remove all cow-based beef from its menu serves as a rallying cry for other restaurants to follow suit, a company press release said. The choice, the release continued, highlights the importance of making more sustainable decisions, without any compromise on taste. Minit Stop specifically chose to work with Impossible Foods based on strong consumer demand and the brand’s track-record for creating quality meat made from plants.

The flagship product from Impossible Foods requires vastly less land, water and energy than a conventional burger from cows. The award-winning burger rivals ground beef from cows for taste, nutrition and versatility, the release said — a perfect addition to the menus at Minit Stop, known for its home-cooked cuisine.

“We’re seeing more and more residents and visitors opt for Impossible. Impossible’s plant-based burger acts, smells and tastes like beef. So much so, that we can add our own local flavor profile to it,” said Minit Stop Vice President Jon Miyabuchi. “We included ingredients from some of Hawai‘i’s favorite traditional recipes and created a winning combination unique to Minit Stop. Our customers have been asking for the Impossible Burger by name almost since it debuted in 2016. We’re thrilled to give consumers exactly what they want, exactly what our planet needs and with a local flavor profile twist.”

People, planet, pono

Hawai‘i restaurants are among the nation’s highest-volume outlets for Impossible Burger sales, with some restaurants selling more than 100 plant-based patties per day. Minit Stop anticipates unprecedented sales volume of the Impossible Burger, which just last month debuted on grocery store shelves and immediately rocketed to the No. 1 position among all packaged goods sold at some of America’s favorite grocery stores, the release said.

Minit Stop has 18 stores throughout Hawai‘i and Maui islands where people can refuel their cars and their stomachs. Two of their locations are fuel kiosks. The company embraces the concept of pono, to do what is right, including for people and the planet, the release continued.

Minit Stop estimates that it will serve up to 6,875 pounds of Impossible meat per month, and up to 82,500 pounds for the first year. That’s equivalent to removing 200 cars from the road for a year, preserving a land area of more than 400 football fields large and saving enough water to fill 55 million standard-size water bottles, the company said.

Each of Minit Stop’s 16 store locations offers an island menu of “home-cooked” entrees and is most famous for their Minit Stop Fried Chicken, along with a wide variety of fresh salads and sandwiches daily. The hometown favorite will also be showcasing a variety of its Impossible menu items at A Taste of Hilo on Sunday, Oct. 20.

Minit Stop will offer nine different Impossible meal combinations, ranging from $7.49 to $12.99. The initial Impossible menu includes:

● Impossible™ Sandwiches in regular and Teri Burger flavors (debuting later this year)

● Impossible™ Burger Bowls in Meatloaf, Teri Burger, and Hamburger Steak styles

● Impossible™ Burger Cheeseburger Flying Saucers — a Minit Stop signature item (debuting later this year)

● Impossible™ Burger Plate Lunches in Meatloaf, Teri Burger, and Hamburger Steak styles

Demand

The Impossible Burger is served in more than 17,000 restaurants in all 50 states and in nearly every type of cuisine — from burgers, tacos and pizza to poke sushi burritos.

The Impossible Burger is now America’s most popular late-night delivery snack, according to Grubhub’s “State of the Plate” report, with delivery sales surging 529% in the first half of 2019.

This summer, Impossible Foods announced a co-manufacturing collaboration with global food provider OSI Group, one of the largest food producers in the world. OSI has already begun to produce the Impossible Burger, adding short-term capacity to Impossible Foods’ plant in Oakland, Calif. OSI will continue to expand the production of Impossible Foods’ flagship product throughout 2019 and thereafter.

The Impossible Slider at White Castle is considered one of America’s best fast-food burgers, and Impossible Burger mentions on Yelp are up. Political commentator and Texas cattle rancher Glenn Beck couldn’t tell the difference between the Impossible Burger and ground beef from cows in a side-by-side taste test, and the Washington Post called Impossible’s plant-based burger a “wake-up call to the meat industry.”

In April, the world’s second-largest burger chain, Burger King, debuted the Impossible Whopper in a regional test in St. Louis. The regional test of the Impossible Whopper at Burger King restaurants in St. Louis went exceedingly well. In August, the Miami-based restaurant chain rolled out the Impossible Whopper to 7,200 US restaurants nationwide.

Stay tuned for more news — including the next retail launches — by visiting impossiblefoods.com/media and on social media.