What's New | HartBeat While the past 200 years have seen endless fads come and go, the world of health & wellness is here to stay. Check out our Road to Wellness infographic! Launch» September 1, From Eating Occasion to Store Shelf August 25, Oprah, Food and Us August 18, 3 Shopper Marketing Myths

home : hartbeat : flavor-evolution-from-restaurant-to-cpg

10.22.2008

“HartBeat” is The Hartman Group's FREE online newsletter, providing insight, analysis, information and strategy to give business leaders the knowledge and vision to build sustainable brands.

Healthy Eating Trends 2009 Who’s Eating Healthy? Where? When? Why? Much of the available data in the marketplace fails to provide a reason “why” observed shifts occur. The Hartman Group, Inc.’s Healthy Eating Trends 2009 syndicated study converts understanding the complexities and nuances of consumer attitudes and behaviors related to healthy food and beverage products and services into business opportunities Sign-up for Healthy Eating Trends 2009 today! >>

---

READMORE...

---

For more Hartman Group articles on CHANGING FOOD CULTURE, click here...

09.03.2008 "World Tripping Cuisine: Young Americans Go Global"

06.25.2008 "Chef Confidential: Tales from the Frontlines of Food Culture

04.16.2008 "Food Trends of College Students"

04.02.2008 "What Emerging Dining Trends Can Teach Us"

02.06.2008 "Understanding Consumer Culture"

03.28.2007 "The 'Fiber' of Organics"

11.14.2007 "4 Signs of Changing Tastes: The Adoption of Ethnic Foods in America"

11.07.2007"Fresh Thinking on Fresh"

09.05.2007 "Restaurant Trends: Looking to the past to tell the future"

08.29.2007"Multicultural Foods"

06.20.2007"4 Key Implications of the Globalization of Food"

04.11.2007"New Paradigms in Eating: From Healthy to Quality"

01.24.2007"What Makes Local Special"

Archives »
Click here for an archive of past HartBeat articles

Flavor Evolution: From Restaurant to CPG

Today, restaurants are taking the food world by storm, offering interesting and exciting flavor experiences. As a result, packaged food companies jumping on the exotic flavor bandwagon are creating products that boast bold ingredients, which not too long ago would have only been found in restaurant menus: kumquat-flavored dry soda, lavender-infused pound cake and champagne pear vinaigrette. Even the most basic, everyday foods like potato chips and crackers are mirroring restaurant menu items with flavors like chipotle pepper, Asiago cheese and Tuscan rosemary.

Within the kitchens of millions of contemporary American households, the lack of any one form of “traditional preparation” (where tastes and cuisines coalesce around one style of cooking) has paved the way for a cultural reimagination of food. Today, we see consumers with a heightened awareness for quality and unbound by culinary rules or tradition. And, in the context of an increasing globalization of tastes and cuisines, they are devoting increasing attention to exploring innovative flavor options both in and out of restaurants.

Tinkering with Tradition

Americans have been reappropriating food, flavors, and cuisines for years — it’s the nature of our melting pot culture. At the same time, juggling the multi-headed facets of complex lifestyles, the heritage of preparing meals from scratch has caused cooking as it was once known to become a rare and disappearing art in many American homes.

American consumers have become spoiled by the endless variety of prepared and packaged food options for years, so, who really needs to cook? In some countries, cooking is an inherent part of the culture, and follows a very specific set of guidelines. Traditional ingredients follow traditional preparations for traditional dishes. End of story.

Yet, flavors and cuisines from tradition-bound countries also serve to influence the wide-ranging American palate: Hazelnuts, while common in European recipes and grown in greatest global quantities in Turkey, serve as an example of an ingredient that lives two lives, one that is bound by tradition (in Europe and the Mediterranean) and another that is open for reinvention.

In the United States, hazelnut is moving far beyond flavoring coffee creamers. It’s showing up on menu items across the country, as well as in packaged foods such as crackers. As an example, restaurants are breaking from the traditional use of hazelnuts and using the flour as a breading for fish — a relatively untraditional use that would be unthinkable in regions devoted to its historic use.

The following table shows examples of restaurant-inspired flavors that have migrated to CPG products.

Private Label is Nimble to New Flavor Profiles

One important gateway for restaurant flavors diffusing into packaged goods is via store brands, where in diverse categories (e.g., frozen, sauces), private label products are taking the lead with cutting-edge flavors and packaging. This is in part due to the flexibility of retail brands, which are able to move quickly to capitalize on flavor and preparation trends when compared to traditional legacy brands. Because of the costs of entry for retail introductions (shelf slotting fees, costs to promote) not all packaged goods brands are thus able to keep pace with flavor innovations occurring in the restaurant world.

The role of retailers, as both product developer and marketer, has placed them in a strategic position to quickly innovate and experiment with new flavor trends. There is also a consumer side to the potential for private label to capitalize on restaurant trends as store brands are typically priced competitively. The risk for shoppers to experiment with private label products is low, thus, they can play in unfamiliar territory at relatively low costs.

Time and time again Trader Joe’s serves as an example of a private label purveyor, which, cognizant of restaurant flavor trends, makes innovative products accessible to the every day consumer. Trader Joe’s offers premium products that typically can be found on competitors shelves at a higher price point. Trader Joe’s shoppers often tell us that they relish the opportunity to experiment with new flavors and foods without breaking their budgets.

In the realm of packaged foods manufacturers, snack foods are a typical entry point for experimentation with restaurant flavors. While it sounds somewhat mundane to “reinvent” a snack food like potato chips, consumers seem to welcome them with open arms (e.g., Kettle Chips). In other words, there is high permissibility with very familiar foods that might be amenable to flavor enhancements.

To further illustrate, the potato chip has come a long way over the years and found great success reinvented with flavors like wasabi, garlic, a variety of herbs and cracked pepper (to name a few). Spicing up a familiar staple with an interesting flavor like wasabi can be appreciated on a variety of levels by a diversity of consumers ranging from the foodie who is well-versed in “all things wasabi” to less culinary-inspired consumer who have no clue what wasabi is other than “a green and interesting flavor.”

Final Course

Shoppers are increasingly seeking out higher quality experiences when it comes to cuisine, and are consistently hoping to find the new flavors and foods they experience in restaurants (e.g., local, seasonal, or ethnic) translated for them on store shelves. Opportunities await those food manufacturers and retailers innovative enough to capitalize on restaurant trends: Consumers increasingly expect the surprise and delight experienced when dining out to be found in diverse packaged goods and prepared foods.

---