Gloop is transforming cutlery consumption in the HORECA sector with an edible and sustainable alternative.

If you’re not embarrassed by the product you sold in the past, you were probably doing something wrong.

With this reflection, Hernán, co-founder of Gloop, sums up one of the ideas that has shaped the project’s evolution: continuous improvement, fast learning, and not being afraid to look back in order to keep growing. The story of Gloop begins at university, where Marta and Hernán, students of Entrepreneurship and Business Innovation, decided to create a project with real impact in sustainability.

From their initial analysis, they identified a clear opportunity: single-use cutlery continued to generate sustainability and user-experience problems. Wooden cutlery created a gritty sensation, paper left an uncomfortable texture —“it’s like ending up eating paper in your mouth”, explains Hernán— and none of the existing alternatives added real value for consumers.

Faced with this scenario, the question that triggered everything emerged: what if, instead of using and throwing it away… we eat it?

This is how Gloop was born, a proposal that combines sustainability, food and experience: edible cutlery that is resistant, crunchy and capable of remaining stable for 20–30 minutes. The result is a product that turns waste into a snack and improves the user experience. Hernán summarizes its potential with a telling figure: “90% of people eat the spoon completely.”

The Gloop case also highlights the enormous volume of waste generated by traditional utensils. In Spain alone, Hernán recalls, “13 million straws are consumed every day.” This figure clearly shows the scale of the challenge and the impact that a more sustainable, functional and pleasant alternative can have.

Along the way, Marta and Hernán have consolidated a project that combines creativity, rigor and an industrial vision. They have learned to iterate quickly, listen to customers and move forward with the resources available, even when those resources were scarce: “Lack of money really sharpens ingenuity,” says Hernán, explaining how they built their first industrial plant by optimizing every decision, sourcing affordable machinery and committing to learning by doing.

This real case shows how the combination of entrepreneurial vision, well-executed technical simplicity and a genuine desire to improve the environment can transform an everyday object into a product with impact. Gloop does not just aim to eliminate waste: it proposes a more fun, sustainable and coherent experience aligned with the real needs of the sector.

If you want to learn all the details, keep reading and discover how Gloop is transforming a classic element through sustainability and impact reduction.

From university to innovation: the origin of Gloop

Gloop was founded in 2022 as the result of a university project with a clear impact-driven vocation. During their studies in Entrepreneurship and Business Innovation, Marta and Hernán were looking for an idea that would bring together technology, sustainability and purpose. Their initial analysis led them to observe legislative changes and the gradual phase-out of single-use products.

Disposable cutlery stood out due to its high environmental impact and poor user experience. As Hernán recalls: “wood also creates that unpleasant feeling in your mouth… many people feel a sort of gritty texture they can’t stand, and paper is literally like eating paper.”

This diagnosis opened up an opportunity: to create cutlery that retained its functionality, avoided waste and could also be eaten. From there came the question that triggered everything:

what if, instead of using and throwing it away… we eat it?

A fun, functional product with impact

Gloop’s approach combines sustainability, food design and user experience. From their early tests, they understood that it was possible to build an alternative that delivered real value to consumers. As Hernán explains: “rethinking it, making a traditional product more fun — something that had never really been given value before.”

The result was a resistant, crunchy piece of cutlery that remains stable for 20–30 minutes and can be turned into a snack after use. The response was immediate:

“90% of people eat the spoon completely,” says Hernán.

The context showed the urgency for change: “in Spain alone, 13 million straws are consumed every day.” A figure that underlines the impact that an edible and sustainable alternative can have.

Key factors in closing their first investment round

Gloop’s first investment round, closed in 2023 and led by Sancus and Decelera, marked a turning point for the company. For Hernán, one of the key learnings was understanding that investment is not an end in itself, but a tool that should be used at the right time and for the right purpose. He sums it up like this: “You have to see whether you really need the money… Lack of money sharpens ingenuity. That’s just how it is.”

Instead of seeking large amounts of capital from the outset, Marta and Hernán opted for disciplined growth, minimizing expenses and prioritizing decisions that allowed them to validate the model without compromising the company’s financial future.

However, one of the most important aspects of this stage was not financial, but human. Hernán stresses that choosing the right partners is strategic, as the relationship with investors will accompany the company for years. “This is a marathon… you have to choose good partners. If I don’t have a good feeling with the person I’m talking to, it’s hard for me to be transparent.”

Today, with a new round almost closed, the company is approaching this capital increase with greater maturity: it is clear about the stage it is in, the milestones it wants to finance and the role that new investors should play in its growth.

Growing in Horeca: listening, learning and co-creating

The Horeca sector was one of Gloop’s main challenges from the very beginning. Their first priority was to find people willing to try new solutions — the so-called early adopters. With them, they were able to validate product features, understand real usage needs and improve the formulation until achieving optimal stability.

One of the most representative cases is Iberostar. Hernán recalls how the relationship started very modestly: “We started with five hotels.” From there, and thanks to the product’s positive reception, implementation expanded to cover all establishments in Spain, Portugal and the Canary Islands, with the possibility of expanding to Mexico as well.

Product improvement has also been crucial. The first prototypes were hard, difficult to bite and did not truly deliver on the promise of being edible. Hernán recalls it with humor: “We had a prototype two years ago that you could barely bite into… and we called it ‘edible’.”

This constant iteration process, together with the fact that more and more customers now contact them directly to request the product, confirms that the product–market fit is becoming increasingly solid.

The major technical challenge: achieving resistance and food-grade quality

One of the most complex challenges for Gloop was the technical dimension of the project. Neither Marta nor Hernán came from the food industry, which forced them to go through a steep learning curve.

Hernán highlights that this phase required adopting a completely new mindset: “It’s extremely important to be open to a steep learning curve and to learn very fast.”

In this process, Marta played a key role by leading all R&D efforts, carrying out thousands of tests throughout 2025 and coordinating the incorporation of specialized technical profiles, such as food technologists and professionals coming from companies like Gullón.

They also relied on external consultants to validate industrial mechanisms or quality processes, but they soon discovered a fundamental truth: “It’s like the saying: I cook it myself and I eat it myself.” The core of the product —its formulation, manufacturing method and performance during use— could not depend on third parties.

The result has been a product of significantly higher quality, stable in different environments, which has become the company’s standard for industrial-scale growth.

Industrialization and roadmap 2026–2027

After validating the product and consolidating their first clients, Marta and Hernán understood that, in order to compete on price and ensure sufficient availability, it was essential to have their own production facility.

The current plant operates like an upgraded workshop, but the goal for 2026–2027 is to increase capacity, automate part of the process and reduce operating costs. As Hernán explains: “What needs to be done is to improve the industrial manufacturing process.” The objective is to compete at almost the same price as traditional alternatives, reaching the market with straws priced between 4 and 4.5 cents.

In parallel, the company aims to maintain the profitability achieved in 2025, the year in which they reached a positive EBITDA, and to sustain moderate but steady annual growth of between 2.8% and 3.5%. In addition, thanks to international clients such as Iberostar, Gloop is entering new markets organically without the need to open local operations from day one.

Advice for FoodTech startups in Horeca

Hernán believes it is essential to define from the outset the type of company you want to build. The question he was asked at the beginning —“What kind of company do you want to have?”— shaped his approach to growth.

On the one hand, there is the path of an industrial FoodTech, with tight margins, slower growth and the need for more contained funding rounds. On the other hand, there is the route of large brands driven by heavy capital injections, rapid growth and pressure from investment funds. Each model determines the commercial strategy, the need for investment, the level of personal risk and the team structure.

Learnings applicable to other impact-driven startups

Looking back, Hernán admits that if he had had in 2022 the knowledge he has today, the journey would have been far more efficient: “If I had known back then everything I know now, we would have saved ourselves so many problems.”

One of the most important lessons is the need to deeply understand the sector you want to operate in, especially when it comes to food.

The product they wanted to introduce —edible cutlery— is a commodity, meaning a mass-market product with low margins and high competition. This requires understanding industrial rhythms, necessary volumes and logistical demands.

It is not enough to read reports or trend analyses; you need to talk to traditional industries, to people who have been manufacturing products for decades, and also to FoodTech startups that have already scaled.

This contrast helps ground expectations, choose better strategies and avoid costly mistakes in early stages.

The role of the ONE Platform in the ecosystem

For Hernán, one of the biggest challenges of entrepreneurship is managing the huge amount of scattered information that exists across the ecosystem. Finding calls for funding, identifying investors, locating partners or accessing relevant data can consume time that a startup simply does not have. That is why he believes the ONE Platform can play a decisive role: “The entrepreneur’s chaos can be turned into order.”

The ONE Platform acts as a centralized access point for public and private ecosystem information. This reduces friction in the search for opportunities, facilitates connections with key stakeholders and allows a startup to move faster with fewer resources.

For projects like Gloop —which have grown organically, cautiously and with strong awareness— these types of tools are especially relevant, as they help teams make better-informed decisions and optimize time and effort during critical growth phases.