Would you pay $100 for a sheet of plywood?  I know that sounds absolutely crazy, but we are almost there.  The price of plywood has been soaring into the stratosphere in recent weeks, and analysts are telling us that it will remain high for the foreseeable future.  Memes about plywood have started to pop up all over social media, but this is no joking matter.  These extraordinarily high prices are causing a lot of pain in the homebuilding industry, and many Americans have had to postpone construction plans indefinitely.  Unfortunately, our national leaders continue to flood the system with even more new money, and that is going to cause even more extreme inflation in the months and years to come.

Prior to the pandemic, any discussions about plywood on social media were likely to be painfully boring, but now everything has changed.  Thanks to skyrocketing prices, plywood has suddenly become a very hot topic, and one post on Facebook that circulated quite widely ended up getting national attention…

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An automatic lawn mower, a smart irrigation system, and an AI-powered bird feeder.

With nowhere to go during quarantine, many Americans put extra effort into literally tending their own backyard.

As reported by The Wall Street Journal, 27% of homeowners overhauled their grassy wares in 2020, and 19% plan on doing a garden project in 2021.

Here’s a WSJ roundup of new-age gardening tech (which we had no idea existed) to help aspiring green thumbs:  READ MORE

The world’s richest clubs like Real Madrid, Manchester United and Juventus want to make a closed-shop league that they themselves govern.

World football has been rocked by 12 of Europe’s richest football clubs announcing the launch of a controversial NFL-style “Super League,” governed by the very clubs that founded it.

The plans have drawn widespread condemnation from supporters groups, high profile football personalities, and politicians. Clubs and players involved in the so-called European Super League face possible sanctions.

The founders are Arsenal FC, Chelsea FC, Liverpool FC, Manchester City, Manchester United and Tottenham Hotspur from England, AC Milan, FC Internazionale Milano and Juventus FC from Italy, and Spain’s Atlético de Madrid, FC Barcelona and Real Madrid CF. The league has not been joined by any French or German clubs.

Europe’s main footballing bodies condemned the announcement. A joint statement by UEFA, the English Football Association, the Premier League, the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF), LaLiga, the Italian Football Federation (FIGC) and Lega Serie A said that they “will remain united in our efforts to stop this cynical project, a project that is founded on the self-interest of a few clubs at a time when society needs solidarity more than ever.”

“We will consider all measures available to us, at all levels, both judicial and sporting in order to prevent this happening. Football is based on open competitions and sporting merit; it cannot be any other way.”

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Don’t let the adjective in “fake meat” fool you — the money involved is very, very real.

The global market for plant-based meat alternatives is projected to reach $450B by 2040, as reported by Bloomberg.

Today, the leader in the market is Beyond Meat…

… which can be found in more places than its leading competitor, Impossible Foods:

• US restaurants: Beyond (42k) vs. Impossible (30k+)
• International markets: Beyond (80+) vs. Impossible (5)
• Share of frozen/refrigerated retail meat substitutes: Beyond (22%) vs. Impossible (9%)

Meanwhile, Beyond Meat is publicly traded with a market cap of ~$9B while Impossible Foods notched a valuation of $4B in its latest fundraising round (though that number could skyrocket on a prospective IPO).

The pandemic has improved Impossible’s position

While Beyond has high-profile partnerships (e.g., McDonald’s), it relies heavily on the small restaurant chains and independent businesses that make up a majority of its customers, who were hit hard by the pandemic.

Conversely, Impossible relies on major chains like Starbucks and Burger King that have been somewhat “pandemic-resilient.”

Impossible has also made significant headway in supermarkets, growing its presence from 150 to 20k+ locations in the past year.

Aggressively going after market share

Impossible is wooing grocers and restaurants by cutting the price of its patties and other substitutes. In fact, the prices are near cost competitive to real beef itself, and Beyond has responded with its own promotions.

The fake meat awareness raised by Beyond and Impossible is bringing serious competition:

• Huge grocery chains: Kroger, Wegmans, and Albertsons all have white label faux meat products
• Meat producers: Smithfield and JBS have their own fake meat lines

As it stands, fake meat only makes up 2.7% of total packaged meat sales. For Beyond Meat, the competition for fake meat will only get more real.