RPL supported Foresight Group on its investment in Harvest London, a prominent UK-based controlled environment agriculture company specialising in vertical farming. RPL provided a full suite of CDD including UK-wide market sizing, benchmarking product prices, field research, independent interviews with experts, and on-site visits to Harvest London's factory and New Spitalfields Market.

​

Established in 2017 by founders Chris Davies and Matt Chlebek, Harvest London has developed two farms utilising hydroponic vertical farming techniques. Starting with basil, Harvest has now grown over 100 different crops using hydroponic vertical farming techniques. Customers so far have included Pizza Pilgrims and Compass Group.

​

RPL's work focused on defining vertical farming and its potential benefits versus traditional open-field and glasshouse growing methods, market sizing and segmentation of budget/standard/premium herbs and salads, price benchmarking of manufacturer's selling prices and Harvest's competitiveness, existing customer referencing and independent market expert interviews, and an in-depth review of M&A activity globally.

​

RPL's approach included extensive desk research - profiling supermarket and hospitality herb and salad prices, customer referencing and independent market expert calls. We also conducted field research, visiting Harvest HQ (getting to sample the goods) and a team trip to New Spitalfields Market in East London (at 5am!), enabling first-hand observation, in-person interviewing (cold) with wholesalers and pricing data collection. 

​

As a result of RPL's efforts, Foresight and management were able to gain a greater understanding of the market and competitive landscapes for herbs and salads into the UK retail and hospitality industries.