Zeno Group Blog

On Monday, Zeno Group hosted a roundtable discussion about food, beverage and nutrition trends for 2009 and beyond, and the implications for business. Never before have the opportunities, threats and stakeholders been so diverse. Who could have ever thought eating and drinking would get this complicated?

Sylvia Rowe, President of SR Strategy LLC, kicked off the presentations with an overview of the unprecedented “convergence” of food and beverage trends: as risk, as medicine, as ethics and values, and as fuel. “Obesity continues to the lens through which all nutrition issues are viewed today,” noted Sylvia. Interestingly, the importance of sustainability was mentioned in relation to 2 distinctly different notions: the sustainability of production and the sustainability of consumer behavior change. (Given that it was World Oceans Day with Ted Danson on CNN warning of imperiled global fishing stocks, sustainability was clearly in the headlines and central to the roundtable discussions.)

Following Sylvia’s remarks was Nutritionist Ashley Koff, RD. From the perspectives of her many clients and the media, Ashley emphasized the importance of simplifying the message to an overwhelmed consumer. Balancing new discoveries related to the functional benefits of foods and food ingredients is ever challenging, while the promise of new advances, such as personalized nutrition tailored to an individual’s DNA, is off in the future. Across the board, addressing energy is a key.

Zeno Group’s Nick Mendoza rounded out the presentations with a sampling of food and beverage brand social media programs. Today’s consumers discuss the brands they eat and drink frequently with their friends. To participate in these conversations, a healthy social media program requires brands to communicate with transparency, while always listening first and valuing the relationship. Authentic engagement and audience empowerment should be driving social media activities, rather than self-serving promotions or a soapbox mentality.

Representatives from O.N.E. Natural Experience and Nuttzo brought along their products for everyone’s enjoyment. The FDA representative also brought an array of the agency’s communications tools.

With the release of the movie Food, Inc. coming later this week and the deliberations around the 2010 food guidance system (the heavily anticipated next food “pyramid”) still very much underway, food and beverage producers and marketers need to be ready to tout their advances and protect their brands in these dynamic times.

With uncertainty about the economy and conflicting news reports, it’s difficult to predict how natural and organic product sales will fare – will they continue to soar or continue to slow? The industry is betting on the former, with 26,000 people attending the Natural Products Expo East trade show held two weeks ago in Boston. Even if we can’t predict sales, there were some evident trends. With the economy causing people to eat more meals at home, convenient, restaurant quality meals that consumers can purchase in the frozen food section and simply heat up are going to be hot, as are bulk organic products they can use to create their own meals from scratch. And, with seemingly continuous bad news, comfort foods – think organic chicken pot pie and mac & cheese – are also growing. There was a dramatic increase in the number of Fair Trade products shown, as well as products made with interesting ingredients like heirloom grains and coconut milk.

Last year saw an explosion of such exotic superfoods such as acai, hemp and kombucha and this year, it looks like we will be seeing cici fruit, Indian gooseberries and tart cherries. And, with food allergies on the rise, gluten-free products will also continue to be big. I’ll be attending the Opportunity Green conference here in LA in a couple of weeks, so stay tuned for a report on eco-friendly business.