In May, MTH Unboxing is all about delicious and healthy lunch. The founders of MARKTKOST Laura-Maria Horn and Lucia Cloth reveal how lunch and tech go together for them and how the MTH Accelerator has helped them on their journey.
MTH Accelerator: What did you do before MARKTKOST?
Laura: During my business studies, I actually owned a small catering company. In the last decade, I‘ve worked for several large catering and event companies. Through these experiences, I became aware of the need that small companies have: to offer better catering options to their employees. I’ve always loved an entrepreneurial challenge, and this paved the way for me to create MARKTKOST.
Lucia: Before joining MARKTKOST, I worked as a freelance computer scientist for various companies in the food industry and for numerous projects in Berlin.
MTH Accelerator: What do you do when you are not working at MARKTKOST?
Laura: Starting a business is a full-time job—there’s not much time for anything else. But when I do have some free time, I like to go out in the Brandenburg area or try out new recipes for the MARKTKOST menu.
Lucia: I actually like to use my free time to take a deep dive into a specific code.
MTH Accelerator: What is MARKTKOST?
MARKTKOST: MARKTKOST offers lunch options (we call it Lunch-as-a-Service) to companies that don‘t have a cafeteria. Via individual online user accounts, employees of our corporate clients can select healthy meals from our weekly offerings. These lunches are then delivered to the company once a week in reusable jars. Our food does not contain preservatives, and thanks to our special production process, lunches can be kept fresh for the whole week. Meals are ready to eat in just a few minutes, and you can eat them anywhere and at anytime. We offer companies a tech-based option for balanced and sustainable lunches, which do not contain wasteful packaging and do not contribute to food waste, unlike in many cafeterias.
MTH Accelerator: Why the MTH Accelerator?
MARKTKOST: The MTH Accelerator not only offers us an great location in which to work and a wonderful network, but it has been a real help in tackling important issues such as financing. Despite having a lot of work experience, we are new business owners and there are many challenges. Thanks to the support of MTH Accelerator, we have been able to make interesting contacts, which have resulted in great opportunities for sales and PR.
MTH Accelerator: Why MARKTKOST?
MARKTKOST: Many existing catering solutions for companies do not adequately meet their clients’ environmental and nutrion standards, and the food that they provide is dull and nutriously unbalanced. Also, the increasing need for work flexibility brings new challenges for quality employee catering.
MARKTKOST provides small companies—as few as five employees—with the opportunity to offer a variety of sustainable lunch offerings. This is a popular employee benefit, which increases employee satisfaction. In this way, as part of their employer branding strategy, companies can position themselves positively to maintain and recruit talented employees. By using Lunch-as-a-Service, our clients make a straightforward contribution to the sustainability of their company.
MTH Accelerator: What is your mission?
MARKTKOST: Our mission is to offer nutritious, delicious, and sustainable lunch options for employees. In doing so, we support companies in promoting the well-being of their teams and allow them to position themselves as attractive employers. And we offer employees a variety of balanced and fresh lunch options, which are environmentally sustainable.
The MTH Accelerator portfolio is growing and growing. But what exactly do the teams do and, above all, what did they do before they became entrepreneurs? In MTH Unboxing, our new interview series, we shed some light on the subject and introduce the teams in more detail. MTH Accelerator Babelsberg is the program for startups and founding teams from the metropolitan region who are looking to explore technologies and digital business models and take their companies to the next level.
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