Beyond Meat, the California-based meat substitute brand, will one day be a business school case study of failure. The company's CEO famously declared that his aim was to "to completely replace animals in the food system by 2035". What happened? Beyond has never made a profit in 12 years.  Each $1 of product it sold in 2025 cost it $1.95 to make and it has $1 billion of losses on its balance sheet. Beyond is not alone. The plant-based dairy and meat substitute delusion sucked up $20 billion of investment capital only to detonate on contact with reality. Plant-based substitutes sales are sliding across the board. The biggest lesson may be not to allow ourselves to be fooled again by the fantasies of consulting firms and university researchers.