"FOOD 2020: THE FUTURE OF FOOD, NUTRITION & WELLNESSVOICES OF INFLUENCE
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What Food Shoppers Want by Phil Lempert |
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A New Global Currency: Food Purchasing Power Will Give Consumers the Control They Seek |
In marketing circles, the consumer as the ultimate manager of brands is a fairly common idea. Across every industry, everyday people are using the Internet either to praise brands or pillory them. What consumers say about a product or brand can quickly be reflected in a company’s sales, stock price and reputation. That’s a lot of power.
With this power seeming to grow stronger every day, those of us in Ketchum’s Global Food & Nutrition Practice started to wonder just how much power consumers might wield over food brands in the future. So we commissioned the Food 2020 research to answer some key questions: What role do consumers want to play in manufacturing foods? What information do they want from food companies? And what priorities would arise if “the consumer” were literally CEO of a multinational food company?
We focused on five countries: the U.S., the U.K., Germany, Argentina and China. We found some interesting differences in what survey respondents wanted from one country to the next. But perhaps more interestingly, we found some important similarities. The most critical of these is that, across the globe, consumers want and expect more control.
By the year 2020, consumers want to have a greater role in determining product ingredients, safety and quality, and they expect food companies to do more to address food shortages, food safety and rising food prices. And if they could be CEO, 65 percent of consumers would make “improving human nutrition” a top priority.
In short, consumers expect their food purchases to buy them more than just something to eat.
What consumers spend on food adds up to a lot. In 2007, U.S. consumers alone spent $953.3 billion on food (at home and away from home), according to the United States Department of Agriculture. Among all the nations in our survey, annual per capita expenditures on food range from $308 in mainland China, $789 in Argentina, $2,223 in the U.S., $2,351 in the U.K, and $2,497 in Germany. This purchasing power is more than just dollars. It is, in fact, a new global currency. And our survey indicates that consumers will use it to “buy” the changes they want to see.
Food companies around the world—especially global ones—should take note. In more developed countries especially, if one product or brand doesn’t allow consumers to have the input they want, another certainly will. Within the next decade even, it is not outside the realm of possibility that consumers will have a direct say in how companies spend their dollars and use their resources to effect change around the world.
That poses a challenge. Every food company knows that consumers are investigating food labels; yet, the things they are most likely to seek consumer input on are taste and convenience. They have not gone out in a major way to engage consumers at large in the R&D process by asking them “What do you want to see in products?” or “What do you want this product to do?” Our research indicates that seeking this kind of input early and routinely will be the hallmark of successful food marketing companies in the future.
While this poses significant logistical challenges, there are premium profits to be made by companies that position themselves now to meet increased expectations. More than 40 percent of consumers in the survey said they would be likely to pay more for their food if it brought healthier and more affordable foods to those in need, and nearly 50 percent would likely pay more if the food brought clean, drinkable water to those in need.
By and large, consumers around the globe would gladly exchange the global currency of their food purchases for greater global good. Companies who meet this demand—and communicate it effectively—can make this a profitable transaction.
