Episode 83: Jenny Du, Apeel

A third of all food produced never reaches our plates. In this episode of The Capitalist Hippie, host Marco Pimentel sits down with Jenny Du from Apeel to unpack how a $10,000 prize and a simple question about food waste grew into a venture-backed unicorn valued at $2 billion.

While traditional produce protection relies heavily on refrigeration, fungicides, and plastic packaging, Apeel created something radically different: an invisible, edible coating made from the same materials found in peels, pulps, and seeds of plants we already eat. This plant-based “second skin” dramatically extends shelf life by preventing moisture loss and oxidation—turning that fleeting moment of perfect avocado ripeness from hours into days.

Jenny explains the problem that they couldn’t unhear, “A third of the food that we produce never has a chance to be eaten. That’s quite crazy. And then you have 800 million people who don’t have enough to eat chronically every day.”

What makes Apeel’s approach revolutionary isn’t just the technology, it’s how they’ve navigated complex supply chains with misaligned incentives. From replacing plastic cucumber wraps with edible protection to enabling asparagus to travel by boat instead of emissions-heavy air freight, they’re proving that sustainability and profitability can coexist.

After raising $635 million from investors including Gates, Oprah, and Temasek, Apeel is now streamlining their approach—simplifying application processes, eliminating specialized equipment requirements, and leveraging AI and data to predict produce quality. The result is a business that doesn’t just extend shelf life, it’s fundamentally reimagining how we value, protect, and distribute the food we grow.