Well, so much for the best-laid plans of mice and men. Or should that old chestnut be revised to read: “the best laid plans of crickets and men”?

Times are tough these days for the Aspire Food Group facility in London, Ont.

Let’s start with the “food” part of the company’s name. No, we’re not talking beef, pork, chicken, nor fish. Rather, crickets occupy the 150,000 sq.-ft. barn. Indeed, the enormous cube-like structure, reminiscent of a Borg ship from Star Trek, is home to literally BILLIONS of edible crickets.

The facility was unveiled in 2022 with much fanfare – not to mention some $8.5 million in taxpayer dollars – to produce edible cricket products.

Canada is now home to the world's largest cricket farm, as construction firm EllisDon announced on Twitter that development at Aspire Food Group's new plant in London, Ontario was finished.

MORE: https://t.co/c4w9ReYfAN pic.twitter.com/37lL1xeKqT

— Rebel News Canada (@RebelNews_CA) June 17, 2022

Housing four billion crickets at any given time (who has the task of counting the bugs?), the mission statement of the plant was to churn out 13 million kilograms of edible crickets each year.

Just one hitch: it doesn’t look like there’s much of a demand for cricket sandwiches.

Indeed, last November, Aspire laid off two thirds of its workforce (going from 150 employees to the current 50) and significantly cut back shifts. Also, the original CEO has departed. And the company stated it needs to make “some improvements to its manufacturing system.”

Improvements? Gee, how about producing foodstuff that people and pets actually want to eat? Because when it comes to crickets on the dinner plate, very few people are buying into the advice of World Economic Forum head honcho Klaus Schwab.

By the way, Mr. Schwab, maybe more of us “little people” would be more inclined to chomp into a cricket sandwich as soon as you substitute your T-bone steak for such an alleged delicacy.

WATCH: Maybe we all "just need to get used to" eating bugs, says a sales rep for Pumba, a company pitching energy bars made with meal worm protein powder at the World Economic Forum.

After all, people in parts of Asia and Africa are doing it, so why shouldn't you eat the bugs? pic.twitter.com/WIG3q8F8mi

— Rebel News (@RebelNewsOnline) January 27, 2025

But here’s the crux of the matter: crickets are meant to be a food substitute. Yet, what do crickets eat? Well, that would be "spinach, lettuce, cabbage, bok choy, carrots, sweet potatoes, apples, bananas, broccoli, cauliflower and more.”

In other words, Aspire is raising crickets as a food replacement (that most people do NOT want to eat) by feeding them fruits and vegetables that most people DO want to eat.

Sorry, does not compute…

And what about health concerns? For example, insects are not good for a human being if one has an allergic reaction to shellfish and dust mites.

In the final analysis, based on the Aspire experience, it looks like not a lot of consumers are aspiring to eat bugs.

Personally, we don’t care what anyone else eats. All we ask is that you do it on your own dime.

Indeed, given that the return on investment at Aspire looks downright bleak, where is the logic in the federal government spending millions of our tax dollars subsidizing insect factories producing products very few people want to consume?

Besides, aren’t the feds already cash-strapped when it comes to investing billions of dollars subsidizing EV battery plants to produce, well, overpriced vehicles that very few of us want to drive?

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