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Follow Your Heart dips into pancake batter

Trailblazing vegan brand Follow Your Heart has entered a new category with the launch of its Rocket Cakes bottled pancake batter mix. The mix is a refrigerated batter made from corn, white rice and millet flours and is gluten-free, soy-free and non-GMO and can be used for either pancakes or waffles.

This new product announcement comes shortly after French dairy conglomerate Danone acquired the Los Angeles-based vegan dairy maker, Follow Your Heart, in order to expand its plant-based portfolio.

Rocket Cakes is yet another addition to the growing roster of vegan brands that Follow Your Heart has pioneered. In addition to its Vegenaise, the longtime vegan brand boasts plant-based cheeses, plant-based dressings and VeganEgg as part of its product lineup. However, this foray into the baking aisle is an entirely new adventure for Follow Your Heart. In order to successfully accomplish the debut of this new product line, the brand did not develop this product in isolation. Instead, the vegan cooking business Spork Foods helped develop Rocket Cakes alongside Follow Your Heart.

The research and development for this product took five years for a recipe that would produce fluffy, better-for-you pancakes with the ability to entice consumers to consume breakfast more frequently. While an appealing product is instrumental in increasing sales, the launch of this batter also coincides with an uptick in at-home breakfast consumption.

During the pandemic, lockdowns forced many more people to remain home for the most important meal of the day, which led to a larger demand for breakfast foods, including a 25% increase in pancake consumption and a 20% jump in waffle consumption last year, according to GlobalData. With an elevated number of consumers enjoying breakfast and 71% of people saying they intend to continue to cook at home even after the pandemic ends, according to a January survey by consumer market research firm Hunter, Rocket Cakes are landing at an opportune time.