Matthijs Westerwoudt is the co-founder of Wilder Land, a company transforming native plants, often considered weeds, into highly desirable products. These plants, once dismissed as unwanted, are now being used to create delicious drinks, herbal teas, kombuchas, fermented teas, and even pasta. The company pays farmers more per square meter than they would earn from any other crop. How do they achieve this? First, by ensuring that these products taste as good as, or even better than, those made from monoculture crops. Second, through exceptional branding—highlighting the appeal of “nature-restoring” drinks over the concept of “biodiversity-restoring” beverages. The secret to success lies in continuous testing and refinement. In short, they are making biodiversity not just important, but incredibly tasty.
In the Netherlands, many things are well-organized, but the country also holds the unfortunate title of being a world leader in biodiversity loss. This raises the question: how can farmers be compensated for the extra biodiversity they create or support? While the idea of biodiversity credits might come to mind, these are difficult to measure and not yet fully developed. Wilder Land found a different solution for it.
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THE NETHERLANDS IS THE WORLD CHAMPION IN BIODIVERSITY LOSS. HOW DO YOU SELL BIODIVERSITY?
There is a waiting list of farmers who want to work with Wilder Land, but the market side needs to be addressed.
”At the moment, we have a waiting list of farmers who want to work with us. So, there’s way more farmers that would love to take that first, second, and third step into becoming more diverse. So, the bigger we grow, the more we can do with farmers.” Matthijs Westerwoudt
”When we started, we also looked at the Netherlands from a natural perspective. If you look into the Netherlands, what’s going on? So, we’re one of the best in the world when it comes to intensive agriculture. But we’re world champions of biodiversity loss” Matthijs Westerwoudt
”The first thing we actually did was create a website. […] We thought, okay, we need to be vertically integrated, shortest chain as possible. So direct to consumer is the logical step. So okay, let’s start a website, and then we felt our tea was nice to start with because it could go through the mailbox. […] So we started with a website selling local herbal tea. The cool thing is that you can easily test your proposition. So, what do we need to talk about bees? Or do we need to talk about biodiversity, regenerative, or local, or what is the thing that would stick…” Matthijs Westerwoudt
WHY TASTE IS SO IMPORTANT
Working with a tastemaker to create unique flavours and partnering with other companies for white label bottling highlight the importance of collaboration in the industry.
”We work together with a lot of different companies. And for every product, we work together with a tastemaker, someone to…’make this nice’, and for every product, we look for a producer or a partner. But it’s possible. So, we have this whole ecosystem of people helping us to make the product taste better and also doing the processing with us or for us.” Matthijs Westerwoudt
”If you said, Yeah, we have this cool drink, local, nature-recovering, come have a look. This is the farm where your soft drink is growing; then why not try that brand? And so now what we see is that, based on the quality, people are coming back because they like the products we sell. And I think the taste has to be good. And then I think, yeah, we can grow way bigger.” Matthijs Westerwoudt
ONLINE DIRECT SALES ARE IDEAL TO TEST PRODUCTS
Distributors test new products through direct-to-consumer sales.
”We have three or four channels, direct to consumer; 25% of our revenue comes from direct to consumer. 25% restaurants and bars, 25% small retail, like farm shops, and specialised retail. And then the last 25 are end-of-year gifts. The nice thing about direct-to-consumer is that we can easily test new products.” Matthijs Westerwoud
”Make a small batch, see if it works, and get feedback: ‘People, let us know. Do you like it? Or what should be done better? And then, if it works, we can take it to restaurants. […] It’s the easiest way. As we started testing, direct-to-consumer is great.” Matthijs Westerwoudt
NATIVE PLANTS ARE SO IMPORTANT FOR INSECTS AND BIRDS
Focusing on markets and creating unique products with a local touch can help businesses succeed and grow.
”We want to export the model. We don’t want to export Dutch nature-recovering tea.”
”Everybody in the world should eat their local ecosystem. If you get more native plants into your diet, farmers will need to grow those into crops, and then by having more native plants on farmlands, way more of these butterflies and birds will come back, and deer and everything, insects as a cornerstone species, the rest will follow.”
– Matthijs Westerwoudt
”If you want to also improve the biodiversity aspects, and if you look from an ecological perspective, insects love native plants. […] The insects living in the Netherlands cannot work with a Hungarian plant because it’s super specific. […] Because our insects and these plants have coexisted for more than 12,000 years.” Matthijs Westerwoudt
NATURE RESTORATION SELLS BETTER THAN REGENERATION OR BIODIVERSITY
Matthijs discusses the appeal of selling regenerative farming practices as nature recovery rather than regenerative agriculture.
”We feel that if you sell it as nature recovery, it’s way more attractive than selling it as regenerative. […] For the Netherlands, it works, maybe because the Netherlands has so little biodiversity. That is something that is way more appealing. But I think the name Wilder Land is way more emotional than regen agroecology or these more technical terms.” Matthijs Westerwoudt
”Make it appealing. So, we do not focus on the health aspects of all these herbs, because that could easily be a thing. But maybe in some countries, that works way better. So, of course, every local situation is different.” Matthijs Westerwoudt
PAY FARMERS WELL FOR WEEDS
Wilder Land is turning biodiversity into a business model for farmers.
”65% of the Netherlands is managed by farmers. So, in theory, if you can change their way of working into a model that the more biodiversity they allow on their land, the more they earn, wow, then in theory, you could have a huge impact on biodiversity. So, it needs to work for the farmers, it needs to be integrated into their business model as well.” Matthijs Westerwoudt
”We did some research on herbal tea. And we found out that most of the camomile in the big, big herbal tea brands is coming from Egypt or India. And then we thought, wow, so camomile grows like weed in the Netherlands. And you can make tea and all kinds of other products from it. And then we thought, oh, wow, if we can sell local herbal tea to people in the Netherlands, then we can transform these weeds into a crop. And if we can make crops from weeds, then we can pay farmers for the weeds.” Matthijs Westerwoudt
OTHER POINTS DISCUSSED
Koen and Matthijs also talked about:
- Local food production and exporting the business model
- Rewilding
LINKS:
LINKED INTERVIEWS:
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The above references an opinion and is for information and educational purposes only. It is not intended to be investment advice. Seek a duly licensed professional for investment advice.
Hey! You mentioned an article about a study in Sweden about taxation based on level of nutrients. May you share the link? Thank you!
Hi Valentina, thank you for your comment.
Here it is the link https://medium.com/9outof10-protein-shift-innovation-platform/universal-basic-nutrient-income-institutional-infrastructure-for-2040-food-preparedness-f00f70a84510.