Why food trends are hard to digest

The first week of January wouldn’t be complete without considering the predictions of what we’ll be eating and where we’ll be dining over the next 12 months.

Passions for food, and an appetite for new experiences, reached new levels in 2011 with the arrival of dozens of pop-up ventures, new restaurants and destinations, so how can trends keep emerging in a market where now almost anything goes as long as it tastes good? Ironically, it could be argued that the predictions drive the trends rather than the other way round. Take for instance the predicted trend for pickling. Would we really be rushing out to buy herring and vinegar, or vats of pickled walnuts at the farmers market, if we hadn’t been told that we would? It will inevitably become a trend, big or small, if the media says it will. 

Had Noma not been named World’s Best Restaurant – originally a successful marketing initiative from Restaurant Magazine - two years running, it is unlikely the media would have paid any attention to Scandinavian cuisine. However, a 12-page feature on Nordic cuisine in this month’s Delicious magazine shows there’s no doubt the media believe in this trend. 

Take sustainability in 2011 as the prime example. Hugh brought us the second instalment of Fish Fight on Channel 4 and we showed concern about the fish we were eating. But are consumers still concerned now or was it simply a trend that came and went alongside the media coverage? 

We may well see a rise in demand in 2012 for salt beef, English veal meatballs and salted caramel but who’s to say it’ll consumer demand rather than the presence in the media?

Posted by Liz Lock

If Willy Wonka had a Facebook page...

Thanks to the social web, you can now share anything with anyone anywhere in the world. The trend toward shared experiences online is being replicated offline and its impact can be felt in how we are choosing to eat. The rise of the ‘big night in’ has also placed greater emphasis on the need to provide products to capitalise on the desire to share.  This has given birth to a phenomenon of sharing which has been driving success and innovation in the confectionary category. Out-of-home snacking has dropped by almost 16% over the past 12 months. Kantar usage data shows in-home confectionery occasions are growing 3.4% year-on-year driven by in-home snacking – up 6.2%.

It’s an area in which chocolate brands are faring particularly well with value sales of sharing bags up 9.6% and volume up 8.3%. The sharing of ideas, opinions, media and status updates are all part of what makes social media a powerful force, and this is especially relevant for brands. Adding sharing options to content in online media can lead to more page views and better status in search results.

And with its sponsorship of London 2012 next year Cadbury has perhaps the biggest opportunity to capitalise on the spirit of sharing. In September Cadbury launched an £8m Keep Team GB Pumped campaign inviting consumers to record motivational power training songs via a webcam and share them online. Their Spots & Stripes campaign has also sought to encourage consumers to get involved in competition with their peers and communities. We’ll be watching with interest to see their next move as the games approach. 

Supermarket price wars and the big picture

We Brits have always had a schizophrenic relationship with food and today is a prime example of that dichotomy. On the same day the FT, the Daily Telegraph, the Independent and the Daily Mail report on the UK’s frankly shameful £12bn food waste, the BBC (video) reports on the ‘austerity sandwich’ - two slices of bread with another slice of bread in-between. Surely £12bn could buy a slightly more exciting filling. Meanwhile the supermarket price war is being cited as a reason for falling inflation figures, which in this economic climate must be a good thing.

What the headlines don’t tell you is that neither the food waste nor the retailers’ discounting is sustainable. Food has been (too) cheap and plentiful for many of us for a long time. We need to remember that the global population is growing at such a rate that traditional farming can’t quite keep up. International grain prices have gone through the roof and combined with droughts, floods and now global warming we’re seeing falling agricultural yields just when they need to rise. It can’t be a coincidence that there have been food riots in more than 30 countries. Food security is becoming a concern for everyone. All of a sudden throwing out perfectly okay food is not just a problem for individual households in the UK. 

Posted by Toby Schuster

The reader of the (crisp) pack

We all know how important the description on the packet is when it comes to food. At Phipps we’ve been crunching our way through a hell of a lot of crisps lately, all in the name of research of course, to get under the skin of what drives consumer purchasing in this category. It appears semantics have never been so important when it comes to making that decision on which bag to pick up. It comes as no surprise to us food and wine PRs that descriptions are so important when selling food, as for us the language we use on a daily basis is vital in getting across key messages to the media for our clients.

Our research shows that the language used on crisp packets makes a huge difference in how consumers perceive the brand. We quizzed one hundred people, asking them to select which crisp description would make them want to purchase a bag of crisps the most. A whopping 47% of people picked the winning description ‘Full on Flavour: made from the finest ingredients. 100% natural flavour crisps’. Given that flavour and taste came up as the key motivator in crisp purchasing, we found that those descriptions not referencing flavour and provenance fell foul with our respondents.

Alongside our crisp survey we ran two in-depth focus groups. Our groups of boys and girls (aged 18-55) also showed that neither gender seem to care for health and nutrition labelling on packaging when buying sharing bags of crisps. The general consensus being that in a social occasion you are less worried about calories and salt content. Nearly all of our focus group respondents looked at labelling on 30g bags of crisps however, allowing this information to affect their purchasing decisions. With the government pushing for more nutritional information on food packs, it will be interesting to see if crisp manufacturers bring traffic light labelling to the front of sharing bags of crisps in the future.

For PRs language is our toolbox and selecting which tools to use can be the difference between a successful PR campaign and one that falls on deaf ears. No doubt the annual festival ‘Rioja Tapas Fantasticas’ which we run for Wines from Rioja wouldn’t have proved quite so successful had we named it ‘The London Tapas Festival’. Whilst consumers respond to one set of language, what can appeal to media may be quite different. Call it spin doctoring if you must, but effective PR is an art form few brands can afford to do without. 

Posted by Rachael Everitt

Oddbins on the brink of regaining its sparkle?

Working closely with the wine trade, it’s always sad for us to hear when an independent wine shop or national chain is struggling to stay afloat in these tough economic times. Oddbins has certainly been in trouble recently. Still, after going into administration earlier this year, 37 stores have been kept open and recently re-launched. Our ears perked up when we heard that more than 3,500 of their customers were then asked to price wines in a blind tasting which led to three wines going on sale last Friday at their customer recommended retail prices.

A good PR stunt or a genuine attempt to revive their business?

We think their efforts to overhaul the business are certainly valiant and have already generated a large amount of media coverage. However, in this ever-changing world we live in, will this be enough? With a lacklustre website and a relatively small Twitter and Facebook following, we think Oddbins should perhaps take a leaf out of their competitor, Majestic’s, book. Yes, it is now coming from a smaller base, but social media is a great leveller for brands provided they create compelling content for users to engage with. In lowering their minimum purchase from 12 bottles to six, Majestic have always been ahead of the game in terms of innovation, and now with their integrated digital campaign (each of the stores have their own Twitter feed and blog page), they are leading the way within their sector. With some promising ideas, such as giving greater freedom to store managers and categorising the wines by style rather than country, we think that Oddbins have the potential to rise from the ashes. For the time being, however, we’re holding our breath as to whether they will succeed in becoming a relevant brand once more.

Posted by Sara Evans

The Return of the Big Breakfast

This week we were interested to read about the soft launch of the Hawksmoor breakfast menu (reviewed here by uber blogger Eat Like a Girl). Hawksmoor, famous for London’s greatest steaks, has decided to open its Guildhall restaurant for breakfast from 7am. You may wonder if steak would be a popular choice first thing in the morning, but judging from the reviews so far, Londoners are quite happy to abandon their muesli and go for something with a bit more iron.

When you consider that lots of breakfasts (especially at the weekend) contain plenty of meaty fare such as black pudding, sausage and bacon it’s not a huge leap of the imagination. Meanwhile, at the opposite end of the spectrum, McDonald’s recently launched its Breakfast Wrap – a tortilla wrap containing egg, hash brown, bacon and a sausage patty. Handy and portable it may be, but it’s not exactly healthy. Nor does it particularly adhere to the Government’s new ‘Responsibility Deal’ – a voluntary initiative for brands to reduce sat fat and salt which McDonald’s is part of. However, our view is that it’s all about choice (even we’ve been known to eat last night’s pizza for breakfast). Hawksmoor and McDonalds couldn’t be more different, but whether it’s because food lovers have so much choice they want breakfast time to work harder, or if we’re looking for comforting indulgences when times are hard, one thing is for certain; the big breakfast is back.

Posted by Lynne Shirley

Why going niche could go mainstream

We don’t need to tell you there’s an economic crisis going on – we all know it. But with the biggest and best London Cocktail Week just gone and higher than expected results from major distillers it seems the spirits market is well and truly bucking the trend. Admittedly, alcohol is what the Financial Times calls a “defensive sector that carries on selling through the downturn”, though it’s clear the sector is not immune to thrifty consumers and is facing tough times. A closer look at the sector reveals that growth is actually driven by a small number of categories within the spirits sector, namely higher quality and premium brands. This seems utterly counterintuitive at a time when logic dictates that we should be tightening our belts and trading down, not trading up to more expensive drinks.

An explanation comes in form of James Harkin’s book Niche: Why the market no longer favours the mainstream. He defines a niche product as one most people don’t want but one that is ideally suited for the people who do (subsequently, James argues that any loss of volume should be offset by a widening of value sales and profit margins from the market “sweet spot” – consumers who are willing to pay more for the privilege). The key is to avoid being “stuck in the middle” and one way we believe for drinks brands to avoid the dreaded middle is to position themselves as affordable luxury, a very niche positioning since consumers may not be able to splash out on a 5-star holiday, but a high-quality spirit is still attainable. The trouble is if everyone’s doing it the niche may become the mainstream. 

Posted by Lucy Richardson

Inflation and the future of food PR

Last week’s figures on inflation from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) show that food prices have risen 5.2% year-on-year. In real terms food is now more expensive than any time since 1984. Not surprisingly, discount retailers have seen a marked increase in business as consumers are replacing familiar (and much-loved) household brands with value ranges or no-name products. So are we seeing a race to the bottom when it comes to food prices and if so, what does that mean for food PR? While it’s certainly true that the era of cheap food is over, trading down to cheaper alternatives is only one side of the story. How else could you explain the simultaneous rise in profits for more upmarket food retailers? What is often overlooked in this admittedly confusing picture of consumer spending habits is that brand marketing itself is undergoing a fundamental change. Brands have evolved from something we buy, trust, want, prefer and love to something we actively participate in. Whether it’s through sampling opportunities or social media, engaged brands are valued 18% higher, according to the Interbrand Top Global Brand Report. The lesson for brand managers? The ‘build the brand and they will come’ mantra is fast becoming a thing of the past. Instead, walk, run, go and listen to your consumers. Talk to them (not at them) and secure their loyalty. In other words, think less about campaigns and more about conversations. 

Posted by Toby Schuster

Fickle, cynical and vocal…welcome to Gen Y and the world of youth marketing

Today’s 16-24 year olds are a hard (but not impossible) to reach audience. Yes, they are fickle and extremely marketing-savvy but also a brand’s ideal customer thanks to their disposable income, brand loyalty and unprecedented ability to digitally spread your word. The decline of traditional media and advertising as marketing channels mean that knowing how to reach this audience has become the Holy Grail of PR. Especially when it comes to food and drink they are equally swayed by both various social media platforms such as Tumblr or Facebook and their parents (Faith Popcorn called their tendency to inherit their parents’ brand preferences ‘Brand-Me-Down’ way back in 2003). One thing is worth noting however – they rarely produce the content they so like to share. And this is where food and drink brands have a tremendous opportunity to connect. It’s precisely how the Forbes Magazine blog recently described the key to successful youth marketing but, maybe counterintuitive to this insight, is our belief that in today’s digital world 16-24 year olds also long for real experiences with real people. What does this mean for PR or brand managers? To find out follow the link to Phipps’s presentation on Gen Y…Where Are You?

Posted by Toby Schuster