Upcycling at Scale: How Not Only Powder Turns Food Waste into Value, Community, and Growth

In 2025, sustainability-led food innovation is moving from purpose-driven narratives to commercially grounded operating models. Hong Kong–based Not Only Powder (nop) exemplifies this shift by combining freeze-drying technology, B2B collaboration, and social co-creation to convert one of the world’s most wasted resources—fruit—into scalable food, supplement, and personal care products.

Insights & Strategic Moves

Food waste as a design problem, not a supply anomaly.

nop’s strategy originates from a structural insight: shelf life, not demand, is the primary driver of fruit waste. Co-founder Fioni Fong identified this while running a food waste reduction app for restaurants, leading her to focus on preservation technologies rather than redistribution alone. Fruits were selected as the initial focus because, while both fruits and vegetables are heavily wasted, fruits are more forgiving on taste—critical for consumer acceptance.

Freeze-drying as the core technical unlock.

To extend shelf life while retaining nutritional integrity, nop adopted freeze-drying, a technology traditionally used for long-term food preservation, including space missions. The method retains nutrients effectively while enabling entirely new formats. The company began with fruit crisps before expanding into fruit powders, allowing diversified consumption occasions—from snacking to functional intake—without compromising on ingredient simplicity.

B2B-first monetisation de-risks consumer education.

Although nop’s products are consumer-facing, early growth was anchored in B2B collaborations with foodservice and hospitality players. A notable example involved working with Maxim’s to transform surplus strawberries into a collagen-enriched sparkling drink. This approach converts food waste into incremental revenue streams for partners, positioning nop not just as a sustainability brand, but as a value-creation partner.

AI as an efficiency and insight layer, not a gimmick.

nop is exploring AI-assisted tools to enhance operational precision and future innovation. For fruit volumes exceeding 60kg, AI could be deployed to detect defects not easily visible to the human eye, improving yield efficiency. Longer term, nop is studying AI-enabled personalisation—allowing consumers to input mood, personality type, or preferences to generate flavour suggestions. Aggregated data could then inform product development by surfacing emerging taste and usage trends.

The waste problem is massive—and measurable.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, around 50% of all fruits and vegetables produced globally are lost or wasted, driven by storage, transport, and retail inefficiencies. Losses from fruits and vegetables—including peels, pulp, pomace, and seeds—account for roughly 16% of total food waste and contribute approximately 6% of global greenhouse gas emissions. nop’s model directly targets this inefficiency by valorising materials typically excluded from commercial food chains.

Social co-creation as a second growth pillar.

Beyond material upcycling, nop has embedded social empowerment into its operating model. Initially hiring and training single mothers for packing and production, the company has since evolved into a co-creation framework where young women—fresh graduates and single mothers—take ownership of product development. For example, its newly launched lip balm, made from oil extracted from mango seeds, is fully developed by these women, who also share in the revenue.

From food to personal care: expanding the definition of value.

nop is extending its upcycling approach into personal care, with products such as hand cream made from upcycled orange peels and lip balm derived from mango seed oil. These inputs are typically discarded due to overlooked value, mirroring the company’s philosophy of uplifting both underutilised materials and underrepresented individuals.

Snacks outperform powders in urban Asia.

Market feedback has reshaped nop’s portfolio strategy. While mixed fruit powders were initially expected to perform best due to perceived nutritional density, the company’s top sellers turned out to be freeze-dried fruit crisps. In dense urban markets like Hong Kong, convenience dominates: snacks that require no preparation outperform powders that need liquids, bottles, and mixing. As a result, powders are increasingly positioned as B2B ingredients for F&B operators rather than direct-to-consumer staples.

Regional expansion follows sourcing logic, not just demand.

nop is evaluating expansion into Taiwan and Southeast Asia, including Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. Singapore is attractive as a consumer market due to its fast-paced lifestyle, reliance on imported fruit, hot climate, and familiarity with smoothies and functional beverages. Thailand, Taiwan, and Vietnam are being assessed primarily as sourcing and production hubs, enabling direct farm sourcing of cosmetically rejected fruit. Vietnam is of particular interest due to its established freeze-drying and food manufacturing infrastructure, supporting cost reduction and scalable production.

By integrating preservation technology, B2B collaboration, AI-enabled processes, and social co-creation, Not Only Powder demonstrates how upcycling can evolve from niche sustainability play into a commercially resilient platform. In a world where food waste is both an environmental liability and an economic inefficiency, nop shows that value creation and impact need not be trade-offs—they can be designed together.

#FoodUpcycling #SustainableCPG #FreezeDrying #CircularEconomy #SocialImpact #APACFoodInnovation