Mintel at The Flavor Experience

“Kathy & Cathy” (Hayden and Holley, respectively) appropriately titled their Tuesday morning presentation “Quick Flavor Development Trends Update”. While they covered a good deal of ground in just thirty minutes, a few points on the recession economic downturn jumped out at me. In particular, I believe they succinctly pointed to a few strategies operators and others can employ to keep their business healthy during tough times, including:

• The use of comfort foods connected, either via flavor or preparation (possibly even in the name of the dish), with a sense of nostalgia and memories of better times.
• “Heightening the humble” nature of food by stressing simple ingredients.
• Encouraging diners to splurge, and defining your brand by positioning your restaurant as a destination, where customers will go to spoil themselves (thus potentially offsetting reduced visits with bigger tickets).
• Employing the “bite & sip” theory by offering a small-plates portion of the menu (which research shows increases the average order value as customers order several small plates rather than sharing a single dish).

I found all of the ideas above interesting, in particular the point about comfort and humility. The former seems to be a popular topic this week, while the latter implies some anxiety about consumer backlash. Which seems reasonable, as many Americans may worry first about how much gas it will take to drive to dinner much less how much to spend on an entree.

Following the “Trends Update”, I took in the first half or so of “Purposeful Menu Evolution: A Winning Formula to Stem the Tactical Reactions in a Strategic Marketplace”. The presenter from The Cutting Edge drove home a critical point: branding is critical to your business during lean times.

With an increasingly difficult environment and discerning consumer exerting pressures on everyone in the food business, The Cutting Edge stressed that maintaining a consistent and coherent brand message may be the determining factor between success and failure. Thus, a tactical reaction that does not resonate with your customer will only weaken your brand’s identity.

The presentation almost seemed to set up a counter-point to all of the discussion on trends and change and renovation: that the decision-making process is most important. And if the strategy guiding those decisions is poorly understood, muddled, or overly aspirational, the result will be off the mark. Sadly, I don’t think the audience was up to it. While I hate to admit it, I have a feeling some didn’t make it past the title.

ML