Effects of adding plant-based menu options on meat selection frequency: A randomized controlled experiment

Decreasing meat consumption is a critical element of the EAT-Lancet directive to improve human and planetary health, but scalable, effective solutions remain elusive. Plant-based meat analogues are lauded as a promising approach, but their impact on meat demand remains unknown. We tested whether increasing the number of meat analogues on a restaurant menu would decrease meat selection, as well as whether offering a novel chicken-like meat analogue would specifically decrease chicken selection. In a preregistered, randomized, controlled experiment, 4431 English-fluent adults in the U.S. viewed different versions of the menu from Chipotle. Participants in the three arms were shown a Chipotle menu with the pre-existing meat analogue option, “sofritas”, removed (0 meat analogues); the standard Chipotle menu (1 meat analogue); or the menu with an added, fictitious, meat analogue, “chick'nitas” (2 meat analogues). Adding one or two meat analogues to the menu did not meaningfully reduce the proportion of participants selecting animal-based meat. Offering one meat analogue versus none produced only a 1.14 percentage point (pp) decrease in meat selection (95% CI [−1.02, 3.30], P = .30). For two meat analogues versus none, the estimated decrease was a negligible 2.14 pp. (95% CI [−0.08, 4.36], P = .06). However, availability of a chicken meat analogue slightly reduced demand for chicken specifically by −3.65 pp. (95% CI [−7.16, −0.15], P = .04). Our findings do not support the hypothesis that expanding meat analogue offerings alone can meaningfully shift consumer choices away from meat. • Additional plant-based meat options do not appear to decrease meat consumption. • A chicken-specific plant-based meat analogue barely decreases chicken consumption. • The number of unique plant-based meats does not correlate with meat demand. • Meat demand cannot be decreased solely by introducing more plant-based meats.