Feb 8, 2022
Imagine a world where those who love chicken nuggets can have their cake and eat it too. Simply put, a world where no chicken will lose its life to satisfy the appetite of millions of people who crave chicken nuggets.
If Christie Lagally, CEO of Rebellyous Foods, has her way, you won’t have to imagine. A mechanical engineer who holds five patents, Lagally started the food technology and manufacturing company, Rebellyous Foods, in an effort to end factory farming by creating delicious, widely available, and affordable Plant-Based chicken products.
While there are currently delicious alternatives in the
marketplace, most Plant-Based meats are two to five times the cost
of meat and were developed for the retail sector, making them
inaccessible to many...until now.
A female CEO in a predominantly male-led sector, Lagally is no
stranger to being a woman leader in a man’s world. Prior to
starting Rebellyous, she supervised a team of 35 engineers--mostly
men--at Boeing where she and her team optimized the 777 wing
assembly. What she learned at Boeing is informing how she and her
team are redesigning processing facilities to optimize them for
Plant-Based meat, enabling them to create Plant-Based nuggets that
are crispy on the outside, juicy on the inside, yet affordable.
Ultimately, they hope to replace some of the $40 billion spent
on nuggets, patties, and further processed chicken products sold
annually with their products.
Rebellyous has raised over $18 million so far in venture funding,
including from Joe Montana’s Liquid 2 Venture Fund, and Vulcan
Inc., the company founded by Microsoft co-founder and
philanthropist Paul Allen. Its products are now available at more
than 350 Safeway and Albertson's stores in the Northwest and
Chicagoland area as well as Haggen, Met Market, and Good Eggs in
the SF Bay Area.