This year we attended national shows like Expo West, Future Food Tech and Expo East. SIAL gave us a taste of global food and beverage trends. Sylvio Petto Neto, Director at Manna Tree, traveled to Paris, France for the SIAL show last week. SIAL Paris is the largest food industry trade fair in the world with more than 7,000 exhibitors and 400,000 exhibited products. The event had 10 halls and companies representing over 200 countries. Sylvio took note of the global trends he saw at SIAL.
SIAL talks about the 4 points of the Food Trend Compass: Health, Ethics, Satisfaction and Digital.
- Health: consumers have never been more health-conscious and it is all about what you eat. Health can be achieved by choosing natural products and ingredients.
- Ethics: consumers are very interested in where food is coming from, how it was produced, processed and transported. Taglines such as “from pasture to plate”, “from field to fork” , “meet our farmers” , “local to low-cal” will continue to be drive consumer choices. Evidence of provenance and traceability will be key to keep consumers to trust brands.
- Satisfaction: food is a source of comfort and pleasure. It has to taste good.
- Digital: access to digital tools has become key for food companies to succeed. Consumer are relying more and more on digital innovations (apps, QR codes, web, etc..) to find information and advices about eating better, healthier and ethically.
Other trends:
- Focus on health, clean label, non-artificial ingredients, no sugar, no additives
- Focus on origin of ingredients; planet friendly and health
- Meat and Dairy: Animal based proteins hall was probably bigger than the entire Expo East production
- Focus on provenance and sustainability. Europeans are all in for real meat. Not much focus on what animals eat (grass fed vs grain fed) but how they are raised
- Dairy hall was extremely strong with focus on animal welfare, sustainability. France and Italy dominate the dairy expo with huge focus on high quality and sustainable products
- Plants-based: Different than Expo West and East, SIAL didn’t have many plant-based companies. A few vegan, meat and dairy substitutes but nothing compared to what we have seen in the US
- Companies targeting their products to babies and children: olive oil, cheese, healthy snacks, baby food, infant formula with goat milk
- Functional beverages: very few kombucha companies (some hard kombucha) but lots of energy drinks and many brands focusing on beauty drinks for women (collagen and vitamin based drinks)
- All sorts of functional waters with vitamins, collagen, oxygen, added minerals, etc…
- Seltzer, hard juices and hard lemonades are a key trend as consumers look to reduce alcohol and are increasingly looking for options made with real, natural ingredients
- Non-alcoholic drinks are also a huge trend; it is all about being able to be at a party and still have fun by drinking a cocktail or beverage that looks like an alcoholic one but without alcohol;
- Dried fruits all over with a huge selection of dates and date sugar;
- Mediterranean food and focus on its benefits (locally sourced, clean ingredients)
It is apparent there are some differences between global food shows and national ones in the United States. Manna Tree continues to find value in attending conferences to learn more about the industry and where consumers are shifting behavior. Thank you to Sylvio for his observations on this event!
