Perfect Day was incorporated on April 28, 2014 under the name "Muufri", and was re-named "Perfect Day" in 2016. The Bay Area company was originally focused on the production of dairy goods for direct retail sale to consumers. The name Perfect Day is a reference to the Lou Reedsong of the same name.
Production
Perfect Day announced in late 2017 that they had been negotiating with possible food industry partners whether they might incorporate their manufactured protein into existing food production lines, becoming a business-to-business ingredient company and marking a change in their business strategy of targeting the end-user. In November 2018, the company announced a joint development agreement with Archer Daniels Midland to provide commercial-scale volumes of non-animal whey protein. On July 11, 2019, Perfect Day released its first product, an ice cream made from non-animal whey protein. The launch was limited to 1,000 3-pint bundles available for $60 and sold exclusively through the company's website. The production run sold out within hours. As of October 2019, the company has not announced plans to re-release its ice cream.
Technology
To produce whey and casein proteins from non-animal sources, Perfect Day bioengineered microflora to include DNA sequences that instruct the cells to produce proteins that are conventionally found in cow's milk. The microflora are then grown in fermentation tanks where they convert a carbohydrate source such as corn sugar into flora-based dairy protein. Similar recombinant technology is used elsewhere in the food industry, including to make rennet, and heme. The resulting protein, once separated from the genetically modified microflora, has the same organoleptic and nutritional properties as its animal-derived analog. After they are separated and dried into a powder, the proteins are used as ingredients in other foods that conventionally contain dairy protein.
Some US dairy industry advocates have expressed concern that Perfect Day products will confuse consumers if their labels do not clearly distinguish them from products made from cows. To prevent potential consumer confusion, many US dairy farmers have petitioned the Food and Drug Administration to enforce the definition of milk as the "lacteal secretion from milking one or more healthy cows", which would prevent Perfect Day from referring to their product as milk.
