Foodservice Moving from Mealtime to All-Day Meals

The U.S. labor force participation rate stands at 63%.  With only 63% of consumers working meal time has moved to anytime according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

Consumers are dynamic not static and they are adapting to how things are today and are not trapped in the past.  They like, cash machines, digital payments, food delivery and they want to eat meals and snacks all day long according to Johnson.

The simple fact is consumers these days are eating differently, eating in different places (in front of the 65 inch HDTV) —than they used to. Gone are standard breakfast lunch and dinner dayparts.  Today more and more consumers are simply eating whenever they get hungry or are craving breakfast, lunch or dinner.

Grocery store service delis continue to add menu options for all dayparts driving sales growth to 9.02% year over year garnering restaurant customers according to Johnson.  According to the Technomic’s 2017 Retailer Meal Solutions Consumer Trend Report, 80% of consumers report purchasing prepared meals at least once a month, and more than half—55%—eat prepared foods within an hour after purchase.

Snacking is also a leading reason for consumers purchasing more prepared foods and supports the notion that consumers are eating simply when they are hungry, not because there’s a traditional timestamp involved. According to Technomic’s 2018 Snacking Occasion Consumer Trend Report, 43% of consumers say the reason they purchase a snack is because they’re hungry and it’s not time for a meal yet. Afternoon snacking is the most common, with 75% of consumers saying they snack then, compared to 26% who snack in the morning, 42% at night and 27% late night.

Grocerant niche Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared food is a solution for meal time that does not require time to cook or do dishes.  If success leaves clues selling fresh prepared meals and meal components in new non-traditional locations is a clue for all retailers.  Are you looking for a new point of distribution?  Does your restaurant look more like yesterday than tomorrow?  Why?

Do your food marketing ideations look more like yesterday than tomorrow? Interested in learning how www.FoodserviceSolutions.us can edify your retail food brand while creating a platform for consumer convenient meal participation, differentiation and individualization?  Email us at: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or visit:  www.FoodserviceSolutions.us for more information.

Chain Restaurants are Foodservice Laggards Not Leaders

The Restaurant Industry is not known for trying to be the fastest to market with a ideation in food technology or with menu platform expansion as copycat restaurant concepts proliferate in every sub-sector of the restaurant industry differentiation and growth is left too non-traditional fresh food retailers according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

Recently, TDn2k reveled in new research at its annual Global Best Practices Conference in Dallas; that 33 of the chains in its research universe reported gains in customer traffic during 2018. What did they find?  Well, it’s what our Grocerant Guru® has been pointing out since 1991 the consumer is moving full steam ahead into the fresh prepared Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat meals and meal components.  Your right as regular readers of this blog know they are migrating to the GROCERANT NICHE fresh foods. 

TDn2K analysis of what those 33 companies did differently from the 113 other concepts in the pack revealed they excelled in similar ways. Let’s take a look:

1.       First, the gainers showed “the ability to grow their mid afternoon traffic “Their afternoon traffic was up 9.9%.”

2.       Another area where they outperformed was in off-premise sales. Many of the 146 chains had boosted sales through delivery or carryout, but the takeout increases for the traffic gainers jumped at the head-turning clip of 15%,

3.       Service Counts, the chains that boosted customer counts in 2018 generated 6.5% more positive comments about service than did the traffic losers.

The simple fact is as our Grocerant Guru® identified, quantified, and qualified back in 2011 the retail food Price, Value, Service equilibrium has changed for consumers. The restaurant industries long standing practice of brand and format, protectionism has not served it well.  The sector can will again if willing.

However, it’s at the intersection of the consumer, meals, meal components, and portability that the restaurant sector has the greatest potential for growth.  Restaurants are fresh food manufactures that simply need to reposition their product in the minds-eye of the consumer to increase sales according to Johnson. 

Success does leave clues, are you ready for some fresh ideations? Do your food marketing ideations look more like yesterday than tomorrow? Interested in learning how www.FoodserviceSolutions.us can edify your retail food brand while creating a platform for consumer convenient meal participation, differentiation and individualization?  Email us at: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or visit:  www.FoodserviceSolutions.us for more information.

College Students Demand Increased Grocerant Options

Regular reader of this blog, ask me all the time, why don’t legacy grocery stores, legacy chain restaurants embrace the grocerant niche faster?  It’s simple they want to be what they were 5, 10, and even 15 years ago.  They demand that the marketing team practice brand protectionism according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

What does not change is that college students continue to be the undercurrent of visual change when to come to food, fresh food and on campus dinning. Once again, Ohio State dining services is bringing big changes to campus food and meal plans this fall.

Key among the changes is Oxley’s-to-go; which is located next to Oxley’s by the Numbers, Oxley’s-to-go is a new sandwich concept that includes more locally sourced food and the ability for students with a Traditions plan to use the to-go option.  Thus driving grocerant niche mix & match meal bundling to a new sector of college students empowering them to eat and obtain a meal the way they did at home according to Johnson.

Zia Ahmed, senior director of dining services. “We made some adjustments based on feedback, but this year we felt like it’s been a couple of years that we haven’t had a major revamp of the menu. The biggest changes to the menu have been made to the grab-and-go options available in cafes and market locations across campus.”

Here look at some of the mix and match options of the new grab-and-go items available to students are Japanese-inspired bento boxes, which are single-portion containers which traditionally hold rice, fish or meat and cooked vegetables. Also featured is a custard-like Greek yogurt panna cotta and several new salad options like spicy chicken and cobb.

“Our entire grab-and-go package we’ve revamped and made it a lot more brighter, colorful.” Ahmed said. “They were great before but we’ve made it even better by bringing in more color, more vegetables [and] more fresh items.”

Another big dining modification applies to the unlimited meal plan. Students with this plan will now be able to take Traditions meals to-go once per meal time, up to five times a week.

Ahmed said the change to the to-go option was based entirely off student feedback. “The majority of our ideas, if not all of them, come from student feedback,” he said. “Based on the feedback we received a significant interest from students who were using unlimited plans to have the to-go option available to them.”

Ahmed said he worked with Undergraduate Student Government to gauge what changes students want to bring to dining services. He and USG found that students with the unlimited plan pushed for the to-go option.

My friends let’s cut through the crap.  College students get it, why don’t you?  If you are a fresh food retailer today and your floor plan, menu options, food looks more like yesterday than tomorrow I bet you are capitulating customers?  How many restaurant chains look, and feel more like yesterday?  How are industry customer counts?  Maybe, just maybe it’s time you begin to look a customer ahead. 

Foodservice Solutions® specializes in outsourced business development. We can help you identify, quantify and qualify additional food retail segment opportunities or a new menu product segment and brand and menu integration strategy.  Foodservice Solutions® of Tacoma WA is the global leader in the Grocerant niche visit Facebook.com/Steven Johnson, www.Linkedin.com/in/grocerant/ or www.twitter.com/grocerant/

Fatburger Slims Down

Consumer are dynamic not static and if your company is not evolving with consumers you are simply fading away according to Steven Johnson Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®. When Fatburger announced that they were rolling out a vegan-friendly Burger you knew they were doing all of the right things.

The new Vegan burger is called the Impossible Burger and consumer can add traditional toppings including lettuce, tomato, mayonnaise, mustard, onion, and pickle relish. Customers can also customize with additional items.

An early trendsetter in the better-burger industry, Fatburger's nationwide launch of the Impossible Burger demonstrates the brand's commitment to pushing the envelope for its dedicated customer base. In development since 2011, the Impossible Burger is the world's only burger that handles, smells, cooks, and tastes like ground beef from cows but is made entirely from plants. Its unique texture and flavor has, like Fatburger, earned a cult-like following.

Fatburger CEO, Andy Wiederhorn  stated “I knew from the moment we debuted the Impossible Burger patty in Los Angeles that this was going to do well with our customers. It quickly became one of our best-selling items,” says. “There's no doubt our customers will always love 100 percent beef Fatburgers, but we're hoping to engage both old and new fans alike with a top-notch meat-free option.”

Are you trapped doing what you have always done and doing it the same way?  Interested in learning how www.FoodserviceSolutions.us can edify your retail food brand while creating a platform for consumer convenient meal participation, differentiation and individualization?  Email us at: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or visit:  www.FoodserviceSolutions.us for more information.

Bojangles Expands Branded Invitation

Foodservice Solutions® FIVE P’s of Food marketing were perfected, developed and tested over time utilizing the Grocerant Guru® Steven Johnson time tested foodservice formula: Build, Measure, Learn, and Repeat. Bojangles clearly is focusing on one of the key drives of the Five P’s of Food Marking Price with its new all day breakfast special.

To introduce its new all day breakfast Bojangles’ customers can find a hearty, great tasting breakfast option on their everyday all day menu priced less than two bucks. Yes, Bojangles hot, fresh, made-from-scratch breakfast biscuit sandwiches that will satisfy a major hunger fast through the drive thru or inside.  The new all day, every day Bojangles’ breakfast biscuits that are menu priced less than $2 each (at participating locations) include the:

Smoked Sausage Biscuit

Cheddar Bo Biscuit

Bacon Biscuit

Sausage Biscuit

Gravy Biscuit

Egg Biscuit

Bo-Berry Biscuit

Cinnamon Biscuit

 Let us not forget that it does include  the all new Pork Chop Griller biscuit is $1.99 that is marinated in an all-new dry rub seasoning blend featuring peppery undertones, our tender pork chop is then seared to perfection, locking in that savory, one-of-a-kind flavor only Bojangles’ can deliver. Served inside a hot, made-from-scratch Bojangles’ buttermilk biscuit, the Pork Chop Griller is an amazing taste sensation available at participating locations for only $1.99.

Randy Poindexter, Senior Vice President of Marketing at stated “The Bojangles’ everyday menu has always included a lot of great tasting breakfast choices for less than $2, making us the best value in town”.  Do you have a point of differentiation? Are you utilizing the FIVE P’s of Food Marketing to your advantage? Is your brand an invitation?

Success does leave clues www.FoodserviceSolutions.us  is the global leader in grocerant niche business development.  We can help you identify, quantify and qualify additional food retail segment opportunities.  Has your company had a Grocerant ScoreCard completed a Grocerant Program Assessment, or new Grocerant niche product Ideation?  Want one?  Call 253-759-7869 Email: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us