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12 hours ago
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Snails aren’t just a French delicacy. They have a variety of use cases and are finding their way into beauty labs and biotech research.
Singapore startup WholeSnail is tapping into this trend with the country’s first snail farm, producing cosmeceutical-grade snail slime and ready-to-eat escargot for the local market.
We spoke with founder Stephanie Kudus, 36, and her business partner George Foo, 35, WholeSnail’s Head of Impact, about how they’re cultivating snails for commercial use in Singapore.
An investment banker turned snail farmer
(L to R): Stephanie Kudus and George FooImage./ Credit: WholeSnailThe idea for WholeSnail began with Stephanie, a Singaporean entrepreneur who has spent significant time working and travelling abroad. She first worked as an investment banker in Hong Kong, but later turned to the F&B industry, where she founded Hawaiian food chain Pololi, gaining over a decade of experience running restaurants.
Her love for the creative, hands-on side of the food business led her to explore agriculture—it was a fascination sparked during her travels across Europe, where she frequently visited farms and immersed herself in local agricultural practices.
Snail farms, in particular, caught her attention, as escargot is celebrated as a delicacy there. As an avid escargot lover herself, she realised that most of the escargot served in Singapore came canned, lacking the freshness and delicate texture she’d tasted abroad.
“I kept thinking—why can’t we have fresh escargot here too?” she said.
According to Stephanie, most of the world’s snail supply is still painstakingly foraged by hand from the wild, often by rural communities such as the Roma people who walk long distances to sell them to snail suppliers. “Only about 5 to 10% of the world’s snail supply is actually farmed—that’s where we come in, and we’re the first and only snail farm in Singapore,” she said.
When Stephanie first floated the idea of local snail farming, most people laughed. George, however, did not. Having spent years managing retail brands in his family business, he was at a career crossroads when a mutual friend introduced them. Intrigued by Stephanie’s vision, he decided to join her on the venture and build a brand from scratch.
Building the farm
Image Credit: WholeSnailAfter six months of research, planning, and prototyping various snail habitats, the pair incorporated Karang Foodie, the parent company of WholeSnail, in Jul 2024. Two months later, they acquired the former facility of an insect protein startup to launch the pilot phase of WholeSnail.
To get the business off the ground, they raised US$957,000 (S$1.25 million) in angel funding last year from Grant Wee, founder of The Trapeze Group.
WholeSnail’s initial farm was located at JTC CleanTech Park, occupying just 1,500 sqft. Space and building restrictions meant there was no room for food processing, so Stephanie and George focused solely on breeding and growing snails under carefully controlled conditions.
The duo imported over 40,000 snails from Italy. They are Cornu aspersum, the species commonly used for European escargot. These aren’t your typical African land snails that appear on sidewalks after rain—those are generally not eaten.
Although Stephanie and George didn’t have a scientific background, that didn’t stop them from experimenting. They spent nine months fine-tuning the temperature, humidity, and overall environment to ensure their snails could thrive.
The duo pays close attention to keeping the snails “happy.” According to WholeSnail, happy snails are those that roam, eat, and reproduce freely.
“If the snails are happy, they’ll breed more,” Stephanie explained.
But setting up was a challenge. Initially, WholeSnail considered purchasing snail-growing machinery, but most suppliers catered to foreign climates. They decided instead to create natural, open-air environments that mimic wild habitats, improvising wooden towers where the snails can roam around.
Within weeks, the team began seeing clusters of eggs, a clear sign that their methods were working. These snails take roughly two weeks to hatch, and another five to six months to mature into adults.
Moving to a bigger place
Snails roaming around at WholeSnail’s new facility./ Image Credit: WholeSnailAfter a successful pilot phase, the pair relocated in Sept this year to a larger, food-grade facility at FoodConcept @ Pandan Loop, spanning 5,000 sqft.
The new site offers designated rooms for each stage of snail growth, purging, laboratory work, and processing, enabling a fully integrated operation that combines farming with food production. It’s a clear upgrade from their initial space that was small, dark, and unequipped for food processing.
At Pandan Loop, the team recreates the optimal conditions in which European snails thrive by maintaining cool temperatures and high humidity, misting the environment regularly with a custom irrigation system to simulate rainfall. Regular light cleaning keeps habitats tidy without stressing the snails, while the new site also provides ample sunlight for them to bask in.
Each snail dines on a nutrient-rich formulation developed in-house using vegetable scraps. As nocturnal creatures, they typically “wake up” around 2 PM for their meal.
All of this is supported by upgraded infrastructure. From improvised structures in their old space, WholeSnail has now moved to metal structures lined with PVC pipes.
This is where the snails bury themselves and lay eggs./ Image Credit: WholeSnailWholeSnail also provides pots filled with substrate recycled from hydroponic farms to give snails a safe place to bury themselves and lay eggs. Each snail is hermaphroditic and can lay clusters of eggs weighing about four grams each time.
No “playbook” for snail farming in Singapore
Image Credit: WholeSnailLooking back on their journey, Stephanie recalled that “everything was a challenge.” “There’s no playbook for snail farming in Singapore—we had to design everything from scratch.”
Currently, the team is still settling in their new site and focused on ensuring their snails (only a few thousand remain after the experimentation phase) are healthy and happy. During our visit to the farm, they showed us boxes of snail eggs, carefully cleaned of substrate and ready for breeding.
Healthy snails are selectively chosen for reproduction, and WholeSnail claims that commercialisation has already begun. Talks with restaurants to supply locally sourced, freshly processed snails are ongoing, pending approval from the Singapore Food Agency.
Image Credit: WholeSnailThat said, the path forward may not be easy for WholeSnail.
While snails are efficient, nutritious, and versatile, they’re not yet considered a mainstream alternative protein. According to Stephanie, every 100 grams of snail meat contains 16 to 20 grams of protein—comparable to salmon (22 g) and lean beef (26 g)—but with only 1 to 3 grams of fat. Snails are also rich in iron and low in cholesterol, making them a lean, sustainable protein source.
Still, snails aren’t yet considered a mainstream alternative protein. Despite their strong nutritional profile and low carbon footprint, their small size and delicate texture make them less filling compared to meat or fish, which can make them impractical as a bulk protein for everyday meals.
Yet, the team remains hopeful. Beyond being a source of meat, snails have a variety of uses, which the team intends to leverage.
The shells can be repurposed as serving vessels—dishes perfect for presenting condiments in restaurants—or ground into powder for fertiliser, while the mucin (slime) can be harvested for its anti-aging properties and used in skincare products such as masks and serums.
To extract slime from snails, an activator is released into the chamber of a sliming machine to gently stimulate the snails, prompting them to secrete slime without causing harm or stress. The slime is then collected, filtered through a microfiltration system, and bottled.
The team is currently collaborating with scientists to refine their extraction methods for better quality and efficiency, with the eventual goal of supplying this product locally to skincare firms.
Apart from this, snail eggs can even be brined to produce caviar, offering a sustainable and ethical alternative to traditional fish caviar.
“Unlike sturgeon fish that must be killed to extract their eggs, snails lay theirs naturally outside their bodies,” Stephanie explained. “It’s a gentler process—and a lot more sustainable.”
Changing the “ick” factor
Image Credit: WholeSnailNext on the horizon, WholeSnail is looking to scale up. It aims to process 30 to 40 tonnes of snails annually by mid-2026 for their meat and slime, housing over two million snails at full capacity.
To serve both B2B and B2C sectors, the company believes its key advantage lies in controlling snail hibernation.
Through trial and error, the team discovered how to stimulate hibernation at any stage of a snail’s lifecycle—from egg to juvenile to adult—simply by placing them in refrigerated containers. This allows them to regulate breeding cycles, save space, and reduce waste.
“A double-door refrigerator can hold up to a million eggs in hibernation,” Stephanie said. “It gives us flexibility while letting the snails on the growth sites mature at their own pace.” This system enables WholeSnail to process snails and keep their supply fresh for clients whenever needed.
Beyond farming, WholeSnail aims to change public perception of these creatures. “Besides goat and fish farms, Singapore can soon expect to have a place where people can visit and learn about snails,” said Stephanie.
So far, the team has hosted ten early-access tours for friends, family, and curious visitors—and will open public tours in late Nov, offering a hands-on look into snail farming right here in Singapore.
“When I ask people what they think of snails, most say they’re ‘icky’ or unpleasant,” Stephanie said. “But once they see how clean, happy, and even silly the snails are, they start to see them differently.”
Featured Image Credit: WholeSnail
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