Provenance and authenticity are driving growth within the food and beverage industry, according to new market research.
New Nutrition Business’ annual trends forecast, called ’10 Key Trends in Food, Nutrition and Health 2019′, says the idea of foods and beverages having “provenance” – with a back-story anchored in heritage and trust and perhaps made in a traditional, artisanal way – is now entering the strategies of even the largest companies.
It says the provenance trend is allowing manufacturers to leverage a premium, generating extra value for their brands.
Julian Mellentin, director of New Nutrition Business, said: “The success of the craft beer and sourdough bread markets, which are fuelled by provenance, gives a taste of what the future will look like for many categories.”
In the UK, after years of decline, the bread market grew 4.3% in 2017 thanks to premium-priced artisan products such as sourdough. In Canada, artisan bread has grown 15% in four years to become a $1.12 billion market. In Spain, mass-market bakery chain Panishop earns 20% of its sales from sourdough bread alone.
It’s a similar story in beer, where “craft” and “artisan” beers are now a normal part of the portfolios of giant brewers such as Kirin, Heineken and San Miguel.
In its annual state-of-play report into the craft beer segment, FoodBev magazine found that the number of US breweries was now the highest at any point on record, thanks in part to the rising number of craft and microbreweries.
The latest category to harness the power of provenance is dairy. “The success of Yoplait’s Oui yogurt shows how connecting to the key trends is the surest way to increase your chances of success, even for the very largest companies,” Mellentin said.
Once the market leader in the US yogurt market, Yoplait was late to enter the Greek race and, as a result, still lags behind Chobani and Danone. But with the success of its Oui ‘French-style’ yoghurt brand, sold only in traditional glass jars, it has shown it can create a new type of yogurt based on provenance – a strategy that has proven successful for Greek, Icelandic skyr and Australian-style yogurt.
“Oui by Yoplait shows how the provenance trend is fast transforming mainstream brands,” added Mellentin. “And it shows that wise companies will always tap into several of [our] 10 Key Trends, because it’s connecting to multiple trends that fuels the biggest successes.”
The brand is on track for $100 million (€90 million) in annual sales, despite selling at a 200% premium to regular yogurt on a price per kilo basis. What’s more, Oui has achieved this in a year in which yogurt consumption in the US actually fell slightly.
New Nutrition Business’ report also predicted that some of the industry’s most established trends – like plant-based ingredients, protein, a focus on sugar reduction, and the continued ‘snackification’ of multiple food categories – will remain as prevalent in the coming year.
The payoff between good carbs and bad carbs, the trends of fragmentation and personalisation, a rebirth for fat, and a redefinition of beverages rounded off the report’s trends list.
© FoodBev Media Ltd 2024
