Help keep One Green Planet free and independent! Together we can ensure our platform remains a hub for empowering ideas committed to fighting for a sustainable, healthy, and compassionate world. Please support us in keeping our mission strong.
Now, more than ever, grocery stores are getting on board with offering plant-based options beyond tofu and old staples like Morningstar Farms and Boca Burgers. It’s not just big chains like Whole Foods, which has always had a reputation for carrying (notoriously expensive) vegan options. Target, for example, not only carries its own in-house line of plant-based meat options, it also has an entire refrigerated section dedicated to just plant-based protein. Even Trader Joe’s has its own packaged, meat-free options, vegan mayonnaise, and vegan marshmallows. Regular grocery stores are so on top of their game in terms of carrying plant-based options that it may have had a hand in the world’s first vegan supermarket going bankrupt.
Still, we can’t help but squee when a new, all-vegan grocery opens up because hey — they inevitably end up carrying vegan products you won’t find at the aforementioned establishments. And we can only imagine what kind of goodies will be available at the newest location of Australian vegan market chain, The Cruelty Free Shop, when it opens the world’s largest vegan shop in Melbourne.
The Cruelty Free Shop’s newest location will offer 3,500 vegan products and 1,000 new items, including 50 kinds of vegan cheese, baked goods, cosmetics, home goods, and more.
Are we jealous? Totally. According to recent research, 12 percent of Melbourne’s population eats “little to no meat” and with multiple plant-based restaurants and now, the world’s largest vegan market, the city is earning a name for itself as a vegan hotspot. But hey, New York isn’t so bad in terms of vegan markets, either. At Riverdel, you’ll be overwhelmed, in a good way, by how many different brands of vegan cheese they carry. At Haymaker’s Corner Store you can pick up classic deli slices just like you would at the deli counter at the local grocery store – and Orchard Grocer serves NYC Jewish classics and vegan soft serve.
…Okay, but we would be huge liars if we said that in spite of that, we didn’t want to go to new The Cruelty Free Shop location on its opening day, April 12. We’re always down for supporting new vegan businesses. Can somebody please mail us there?
This is fantastic news in addition to all the vegan groceries that everyday stores now carry. If you’re looking to incorporate more plant-based foods in your diet, we highly recommend checking out the Food Monster App, which is available for both Android and iPhone. With over 8,000 vegan recipes (and over 10 new recipes added daily), you’re going to find something you love!
Lead image source: The Cruelty Free Shop
Twelve percent is impressive and amazing for Australia, a place where there are a lot of dead animals consumed. I know someone from Australia and he would make 4 different kinds of curry which he ate every night -his wife was Pakistani thus the curry (one at a time of course). They each contain a different kind of meat-never veg/vegan and he put it down to being Australian. Good going Melbourne -I am envious even though we have a great food co-op here. Another reason to leave Donald Trump behind.