Luxury restaurateur Michael Käfer relies on vegan food

Munich Feinkost Käfer: It’s a term like Dallmayr coffee or Beluga caviar – in a class of its own. From the head office in Munich-Steinhausen, the owner of the Michael Käfer group of companies supplies delicatessen stores all over Europe. At the Oktoberfest, which is canceled again this year due to the pandemic, he usually supplies 15,000 people a day with roast chicken and meatballs – for non-residents: meatballs. And even in the Reichstag building, the members of parliament eat in his restaurant.

The fact that the well-known top restaurateur has now opened a vegetarian-vegan restaurant – the “Green Beetle” – sets an example for an entire industry. “Sustainability is not just any trend. That will keep us busy for the next few decades, ”said Michael Käfer during an interview with the Handelsblatt on the upper floor of the Munich Käfer-Schänke.

For him, fine dining and sustainability are not mutually exclusive. Rather, every brand has to deal with the conscious use of resources. “Customers and young employees are increasingly asking what we are doing to be sustainable,” he says, and he gives the answer himself: “For me, meat will only be a side dish in the future.” Instead of a 130-gram steak, he says, it is enough a 60-gram steak – of course in good quality.

Restaurateurs across the country are asking themselves the question of sustainability. More and more restaurant owners, delicatessens and start-up founders want to earn money with plant products. “We are only at the beginning of a major change,” says Benjamin Morach, partner at BCG strategy consultancy.

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A BCG study predicts that worldwide sales of meat substitutes should rise from $ 40 billion to $ 290 billion per year by 2035. Every tenth serving of meat, egg or milk will then be replaced by a plant-based alternative.

More and more vegan restaurants

The number of vegan restaurants in Germany has quadrupled from 75 to 300 in the past eight years. “Restaurateurs are starting to offer vegan products – in order to reach young people and not to look old-fashioned,” confirms trend observer Mathias Haas, who analyzes social trends and makes them visible to companies and research institutions.

Because the demand for meatless food is high. According to an Allensbach survey, more than a million Germans largely avoid meat or describe themselves as vegetarians. In the pre-crisis year 2019, 1.2 billion euros were turned over with vegetarian or vegan foods, determined the market researchers from Nielsen.

This development is an opportunity for restaurant owners. For top restaurateurs like Michael Käfer in particular, “plant-based substitute products are a means of serving vegans and being innovative at the same time,” says Haas. In addition, the pressure to create new dishes is “brutal, especially in top gastronomy”. The proportion of vegan options there is still very low. In the coming years, however, top restaurateurs in particular will continue to shape the trend, because budget and “time for questions of meaning” are more available in the premium segment than in establishments in lower price ranges. At the same time, customers are more willing to spend money on sustainable products.

Michael Käfer is the third generation to run the business. In 1930 his grandparents opened a grocery store with wines and bottled beer in Munich. In the sixties the sons Gerd and Helmut Käfer took over the business. They expanded the range to include delicatessen products and established a lunch menu in the Munich headquarters. Michael Käfer joined the management in 1988. Since his father left the company in 1995, he has been managing the business of the Käfer Group as the sole shareholder. His wife Clarissa Käfer works as the commercial manager at the head office. She is responsible for sustainability issues in the group.

The Käfer Group’s turnover in 2020 was 90 million euros. This means that it has shrunk by almost half compared to the year before the crisis, but Käfer claims that it has survived the crisis well thanks to the income from previous years. In order to compensate for the loss of sales, he also developed new forms of distribution.

At virtual birthday parties, for example, the guests meet via video conference; The delicatessen company sends them home food and drinks. At the same time, the restaurateur supplied retirement homes that had to close their kitchens due to Corona. The infrastructure was there. In the area of ​​party service, Käfer is the European market leader in the premium segment.

Climate neutral by 2025

Clarissa Käfer wants to make the company climate-neutral step by step by 2025. As a family business, it is easier to enforce environmental protection, she explains. “Medium-sized companies are not the better people, but they have the system advantage of being able to act quickly and independently,” she says.

Käfer’s measures are based on the “Greenhouse Gas Protocol”, the standard series for balancing greenhouse gas emissions from the World Resources Institute. Step one covers direct emissions, for example from the consumption of natural gas or petrol, while step two covers indirect greenhouse gas emissions, for example from electricity consumption when processing food. Step three includes all emissions in the value chain. Preventing emissions “is only partially feasible due to the large number of products and suppliers,” explains Käfer.

In order to produce less waste, the group uses artificial intelligence, which uses data from the cash register system, among other things, to predict how much and which dishes the guests will eat on the day.

The vegan meatballs from the Munich start-up Greenforce are particularly popular in Käfer restaurants. Käfer sells silken tofu and burger patties as a ready-made mix in its delicatessen stores. Thomas Isermann produces this product, which consists of pea powder, sunflower seeds and spices, among other things. He has known Käfer for a long time; the two met at food fairs and at the Oktoberfest, he says. He is full of praise: “I don’t know any entrepreneur who is so hard-working and believes in his issues like that.” Anyone who experiences him at the Oktoberfest “while catering or entertaining his guests” will meet a man who “does his job burns “. His core concerns are the origin of the products, the taste and the customer service.

Käfer tasted Isermann’s products several times. The vegan bratwurst tastes particularly good. Käfer also wants to include them in its range soon, says Isermann. In 2022, Isermann even wants to offer vegan burgers in Käfer’s beer tent, the Wiesn tavern. The two can hardly wait for the Oktoberfest to take place again. “Oktoberfest is the best time of the year,” says Michael Käfer. Until then, he will test the sale of the vegan products in the “Green Beetle”.

More: Good for animal welfare and the climate: in future there will be steaks and burgers from the laboratory

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