With $87 Million In Fresh Funding, Lettuce Grower Gotham Greens Plots Greenhouse Expansion
Gotham Greens has spent 11 years convincing grocers like Whole Foods that its locally and sustainably grown lettuces are the future of produce, but after the pandemic upended national supply chains, its sales started to surge.
“It was a real opportunity for us with our shortened supply chain to fill some of those voids,” says Cofounder and CEO Viraj Puri. “This is why we started this business. The supply chain is too long, too fragmented. By building these regional, climate-controlled greenhouses, we can produce consistently and reliably year-round.”
Its eight greenhouses, some of which are on the roofs of Whole Foods stores, today make up the largest indoor growing network in the country. But Puri is now also facing fierce competition and a suddenly hyped industry that investors have poured $1 billion into in the past three months alone. There’s even been a flashy reverse merger announced, of a greenhouse tomato grower that has yet to complete its first harvest backed by investors like Martha Stewart and J.D. Vance, that is expected to start trading before the end of the year.
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