I think there is a missunderstanding due to the communication being inefficient.
Niles, what are your expectations of Huel?
- Seems that you approve food/nutritional products that care about the origin of their ingredients.
-Particularly, you believe that pesticides used in crops can be harmful to humans. I guess you tend to look for organic certificates
-Therefore, you expect companies that you consume would care about this.
- The link seems to be no pesticides, fungicides… = healthy product; therefore if this is not the case you cannot claim yourself to be healthy.
-Besides, you believe that some of the profit should go to relieve environmental causes.
What Huel’s expectations of their products are:
- Quality ingredients.
- Affordable to the general public.
- Able to provide complete nutrition (I guess you could put healthy here) by providing the nutrients the humans need. However, take into account that Huel already “cheats” the guidelines, since it provides with a different macronutrient profile from the recommended.
- Minimal waste.
As you can observe, Huel does not directly belive in organic products as you do. Furthermore, some of the staff members have made points stating that organic Huel would not only be more expensive, but perhaps “not as healthy”.
This is obviously a point of debate; since you and Huel do not seem to see “healthy” the same way. Organic vs non-organic is a long debate that cannot be solved in minutes. You have your ideas about it, Huel has others.
It also seems point #1 of Huel not meeting your expectations. This is OK, you can just have no deal. Huel does not need to be for you.
Therefore, you expect that Huel should not use “Healthy to the human constitution” expression. Again, that is because you have certain thoughts/expectations on what that means. However, for Huel this means that the product they provide is able to meet certain nutritional criteria and improves on your diet.
This is point #2 where your expectations clash.
Besides the healthy and nutrition you also seem to be looking for companies that “give back”. That take part of the profit and contribute to environmental causes. From a business standpoint this is not a must. A business, by nature, is an organization looking for profit. What they do with that profit is “their business”.
Furthermore, you cannot know how much profit Huel is taking. You are talking about millions, but it can be millions in revenue and not profit. This revenue can be invested (and has been invested) to develop new products; in research (new bag with less environmental impact); look for alternative ingredients with better sourcing…
Thus I think that the millions of profit 1 are not there; and 2 they do not need to be invested as you expect. Plus, I think that part of it does go to reduce their environmental impact (new bags, new ingredients…)
Expectation #3 that does not meet. Perhaps it is time to go for the no-deal option. Remember, you do not need to buy Huel. Actually, there are other brands that will align better with your believes (Ample, Ka’chava, Ambronite, Bertrand in EU).
Now does this mean that Huel’s product is trash? No, it means that it is not for you and that is OK. Just like a women’s bra is not for me.
Some positives about Huel that you might want to consider though:
- Reduction in waste when comparing to food in supermarkets (a lot more efficient).
- Provides a nutritional (see I did not use healthy) alternative to those who lack time to cook.
- Provides a good alternative to fast food or other food on the go.
- Gives an affordable nutrition (most organic brands are expensive, prime ingredients are expensive).
- There is a minimal care about environment, since they take into account when taking action. RTD using recyclable bottles and promising to do it even more (even if the RTD itself is not that friendly). Continously looking to improve their non-recyclable bags.
- And who knows, at some point they might put that “profit” into some charitable cause.
So going back to your questions:
- Where does the “profit” go? Salaries, R&D, keeping prices affordable, expanding the business…
- How can you separate them from Monsanto? Truly they are two different animals; but I guess you are referring on how Monsanto is known for not caring about environment. I hope I have answered above that, Huel does care about the environment, even if it is not their #1 priority.
- How are you the good guys? Well, there should be no expectation for Huel to be the good guys, they are just a business (beyond going to the good and evil discussion). But, we see that they take certain decisions based on environmental facts, we “want to believe” they provide the best product they can (they consume it themselves), that they keep the prices low, that whenever possible they look for sustainalbe sources… All this might not be true, but for many are enough for them to be the good guys. However, this might not be enough for you and this is OK.
I hope I have answered your questions.
EXTRA: You seem to be annoyed about the treatment and you have made sure to show it. The treatment you have received has been according to the behaviour you have shown.
If you walk to the White House in street wear with banners with strong inclination (e.g. Monsanto are Evil, You are poisoning us…) you won’t be welcomed in. If you go in wearing a suit, a friendly attitude and a document with your expectations and thoughts; you might encounter a more fruitful discussion.
This is, next time beyond pointing your opinion and imposing it, try to lay out your expectations/queries in a more clear way and ask why this are not met or what Huel’s position is on them.
