Belly Brand offers grain-free banana bread, brownie, cake and cookie mixes, which contain 3-5 grams of protein from bovine collagen peptides and six or eight ingredients total. The mixes are currently available on the brand's website and through select retailers in Texas and New York, including several Central Market stores.
Inspired by the founder’s childhood celiac diagnosis, Belly Brand launched in 2022 with a mission to provide clean-label and gluten-free products to consumers, the company's CEO Jenny Larson told FoodNavigator-USA during a Startup Spotlight interview.
"There is a misconception in the fact that a lot of people think that eating gluten-free means that you are eating healthy, and it is still very easy to eat a gluten-free diet and be eating a lot of junk. After initially removing gluten from my diet, I felt better for a little while, and then a lot of the symptoms that I [dealt] with as a child started to come back, and this time, I knew right away to look at what I was eating," Larson said.
She added, "I realized that the simpler that I was eating, the cleaner I was eating, [and] the less ingredients I was eating, the better I felt. So, it became my mission, essentially, to launch a brand that makes eating really clean very easy and accessible.”
Delivering gut, skin health benefits with collagen
Belly Brand is differentiating itself with collagen, allowing the company to tap into consumer demands for protein, Larson noted.
"There is a misconception in the fact that a lot of people think that eating gluten free means that you are eating healthy, and it is still very easy to eat a gluten-free diet and be eating a lot of junk.” — Belly Brand Foods CEO and Founder Jenny Larson
Marketing and PR firm Matter Communications found that, among 1,000 consumers surveyed, 58% sought protein-packed foods and beverages — below the 64% looking for low-sugar options and above the 52% seeking low-carb products.
“There are people who like the products for what I call the beauty benefits, the hair, the skin [and] the nail support, and then there are those who do know that collagen benefits the gut. ... Collagen is the most abundant form of protein in our bodies. We are born with lots of collagen already circulating through our bodies. It is in our bones, our muscles, and it lines the digestive tract,” she added.
She continued, “I was adding [collagen] to my smoothies [and] my baking because it has no flavor. It does not impact the texture. So, it is really easy to incorporate into your diet. So that is what gave me the idea. But what has been fun about having collagen in our products is ... most people add a spoonful to their coffee in the morning for skin or nails, and so that has made the products more broadly appealing to a broader audience.”
Boosting brand awareness with trade shows ‘can be a bit of a gamble’
Looking ahead, Belly Brand is seeking to grow its retail distribution through the online distributor platform Pod Foods, while also focusing on ways to get her brand out there through trade shows and other events, Larson said.
“I am also going to be leaning into trade shows more in the coming year. That can be a bit of a gamble, because ...the price to entry is quite high — to get space at a trade show is expensive. So, I just want to make sure I am really prepared and to take advantage of those trade show opportunities as they come,” she added.