PETA Says Hats Off to … Hormel?

Group Praises SPAM-Maker for Vegan Pepperoni

For Immediate Release:
September 3, 2021

Contact:
Tapi Mbundure 202-483-7382

PETA may sell a “Vegans Against SPAM” T-shirt, but that isn’t stopping the group from giving credit where credit’s due, in the form of a “Hats Off” Award to Hormel, as the locally based company—notorious for killing millions of pigs each year—is stocking pizzerias nationwide with delicious vegan pepperoni from its Happy Little Plants brand.

“Hormel’s salty pig- and planet-saving pepperoni is a sign of things to come,” says PETA President Ingrid Newkirk. “PETA is telling Hormel not to dip a toe but to dive headfirst into the deep end of the vegan market, which is the best thing it could do as meat and dairy sales dry up.”

Since no one needs to consume meat or dairy, raising and killing animals for food is unjustifiable as well as abysmally cruel to animals and devastating for the environment—and people are waking up. More than half of Americans now purchase vegan options in place of meat and dairy, and the vegan meat market is predicted to be worth more than $4.15 billion by 2026.

In addition to the rise of vegan eating, Hormel has contended with public outrage after a PETA undercover investigation into one of its suppliers revealed that pigs were jabbed in the eyes with clothespins, beaten with metal rods and boards, and abused in other terrible ways by both workers and supervisors. The company is also facing scrutiny for contributing to cruel and deadly tests on pigs in bids to increase its profits, and PETA is calling on Hormel to be done with the controversy by ending its meat production and experiments and becoming an all-vegan company.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to eat”—opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information on PETA’s investigative newsgathering and reporting, please visit PETA.org or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.