An Albertsons store in Laguna Niguel, California
Scott Mlyn | CNBC
Vertical farming company Plenty, an ag-tech unicorn backed by SoftBank, announced Wednesday a partnership with Albertsons, marking the company’s first major retail deal.
Under the multiyear agreement, Plenty will provide 430 Albertsons’ stores across California with four types of greens – baby arugula, baby kale, crispy lettuce and mizuna mix — priced between $4 and $5, in line with other organic greens.
Plenty co-founder and CEO Matt Barnard said the company’s supply chain was uninterrupted during the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, which offered Albertsons a critical proof-point on the company’s value. The ag-tech start-up said that it currently supplies more than a dozen Albertsons stores in the state, and that it could take several years to scale up supply to all 430 stores.
Plenty’s first commercial farm, named Tigris, opened last year in South San Francisco. It shelved plans last year to open another indoor farm in Seattle, in order to prioritize its efforts on a new farm in Compton, California. The Southern California farm will be fully autonomous and help supply Albertsons stores, though it’s unclear when it will open.
Plenty’s backers include Jeff Bezos and Eric Schmidt, and the company most recently raised $175 million in a Series D deal in January 2020, bringing its total raise to $400 million and its valuation to $1.05 billion, according to Pitchbook data. The company uses data analytics, machine learning, and customized lighting to grow 1 million plants at a time and process 200 plants per minute.
Plenty’s operations are nearly autonomous, and a fair share of its early employees came from Tesla. But working alongside engineers are farmers (including the two co-founders) and sensory scientists.
The company’s mission is to tweak all of the production variables to maximize taste, and its advisors include Michelin-rated chefs and restaurateurs Dominique Crenn and Nancy Silverton. Ultimately, Plenty expects to open 500 indoor farms in dense urban areas, and many in food deserts.
While there are formidable contenders in vertical farming, including Kimbal Musk’s Square Roots and Larry Ellison’s Sensei Ag, Barnard said, Plenty’s value proposition to customers is unique.
