Actual Veggies

When Hailey Swartz co-founded Actual Veggies in 2020, she wasn't looking for a lab-grown "bleeding" burger. Instead, she and her co-founder, Jason, set out to solve a common frustration: a grocery aisle filled with highly processed, bland, and preservative-heavy imitation meats. Driven by a mission to make real food as craveable as it is nutritious, Hailey has led the brand from a kitchen-table idea to a category-defining powerhouse. By prioritizing fresh, chef-crafted recipes that use only recognizable vegetables—and absolutely no fillers or fake meats—Hailey and Jason have turned a commitment to clean ingredients into a nationwide success. In this episode, Hailey shares the strategy behind the brand's explosive 732.5% growth and how they maintain their "what you see is what you get" philosophy while scaling to over 7,500 retailers. Inside the Episode: Why Hailey and Jason bet on whole, vibrant ingredients at a time when the industry was obsessed with lab-grown alternatives. The operational hurdles and triumphs of achieving distribution in every single U.S. state within just a few years of launching. How Actual Veggies is expanding its mission with new, family-friendly innovations like "Dino Nuggets" made from real plants to win over the next generation of eaters. Shop here! This podcast episode was made possible by Glimpse — the AI-powered deduction management tool helping CPG brands recover lost revenue from invalid retail deductions. With in-house experts and custom-built AI, Glimpse saves founders time, money, and countless hours so they can focus on scaling. Try it free for 30 days at tryglimpse.com/trial.