Foodservice Solutions

Thursday, September 8, 2011

Retailers find that “Better For You” food is good for the top and bottom line.

Consumers of all ages are looking for and buying “better for you” food today. They are utilizing a confluence of new tools including mobile app’s, from wireless phone, On-line ordering from computers and PDA’s, IPad’s to name just a few. The younger the consumer the more likely they are to find any of these alternate forms of ordering preferable. This is also perceived as better for you from the consumer perspective.

Foodservice consumers responded to a research survey conducted by the International Food Information Council (IFIC) on Functional Foods. The survey found that “89% of Americans agree that certain foods can have benefits for long term health including reducing the risk of disease or other health concerns. Consumer identified the following:

Fruits and vegetables
Fish / seafood
Milk & Yogurt
Meat & poultry
Herbs & spices

What is most interesting to me is that the number one item on the list also appeared as the number one food preferred by college students in dorm meal plans for the past 20 years!

Now think about it, our customers are looking for a better for you food products when they go out to eat and at home. Grocerant ready-to-eat and ready-to-heat prepared food must be comprised of better for you food and available in better for you formats for contemporize consumer relevance.

Prudent retailers will soon understand the power of the Grocerant niche! Ready-to-eat, Ready-to-heat quality bundled meal options that are better for you, create demand in new and alternative channels of sales and distribution.

Since 1991 retail food consultancy Foodservice Solutions® of Tacoma, WA has been the global leader in the Grocerant niche for more on Foodservice Solutions® Bing or Google Grocerants or visit http://www.linkedin.com/in/grocerant, twitter.com/grocerant Email: grocerant@q.com

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Family Food Fast: The rise of the Grocerant.

The Grocerant niche is comprised of Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh and prepared food that is better for you. The niche continues expanding, founded within the restaurant sector, then into grocery stores, convenience stores and now into the retail drug store sector. The grocerant food is entering the convenience store niche at such a fast pace that the C-stores sector of the foodservice industry has lead all other retail food sectors in year over year growth for the past two years.

The primary driver of the grocerant niche is quality food bundled as components allowing and promoting consumer choice. Meal time is now becoming a time of convenient meal participation, with differentiation and individualization for the entire family. When a family can mix and match components everyone wins.

Companies that utilize Foodservice Solutions® 5 P’s of food marketing: Product, Packaging, Placement, Portability and Price; will understand success can be found within the grocerant niche. Building strong sales if they roll out an integrated grocerant niche food program with distinctive differentiated food consumables as an entity with identity by day part.

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Zagat's 2011 National Fast-Food Restaurant Survey results.

This year's Zagat's most popular fast-food chains include:

Mega Chains Large Chains Quick Refreshment

1. Subway 1. Five Guys 1. Starbucks

2. McDonald's 2. Panera Bread 2. Dunkin' Donuts

3. Wendy's 3. Chipotle 3. Culver's

4. Burger King 4. Chick-fil-A 4. Ben & Jerry's

5. Taco Bell 5. In-N-Out Burger 5. Cold Stone Creamery

This year's Top Overall Rated chains (averaging food, facilities and service ratings) are:

Mega Chains Large Chains Quick Refreshment

1. Wendy's 1. Chick-fil-A 1. Pinkberry

2. Subway 2. In-N-Out Burger 2. Red Mango

3. McDonald's 3. Papa Murphy's 3. Peet's Coffee & Tea

4. Pizza Hut 4. Panera Bread 4. Culver's

5. KFC 5. Chipotle Mexican Grill 5. Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf

Zagat surveyors also named the best fast-food items in a variety of categories including:

Burger: Five Guys

Fried Chicken: KFC

Grilled Chicken: Chick-fil-A

Breakfast Sandwiches: McDonald's

Value Menu: McDonald's

Overall Value: McDonald's

Child-Friendly: McDonald's

Drive-Thru: McDonald's

Wings: Buffalo Wild Wings

According to the survey, 69 percent of diners favor calorie count displays; moreover 55 percent report that their dining behavior has been influenced by such calorie counts.

"For better or for worse, fast-food is a major part of American culture, with our average surveyor eating at chain restaurants nearly 11 times per month,” said Tim Zagat, CEO of Zagat Survey. “It's worth noting the majority of surveyors are taking their health seriously and are demanding transparency from the industry. It's also encouraging to see chain restaurants stepping up and offering healthier options."

For the third year in a row, Subway wins for Top Healthy Options, Top Service and Most Popular Mega-Chain. Jason's Deli (Large Chain), and survey newcomer Red Mango (Quick Refreshment) also rank No. 1 for Healthy Options.

A new category this year is Best Wings. The inaugural award goes to fast-food chain Buffalo Wild Wings; KFC followed.

Explaining its success, McDonald's (with more than 33,000 units worldwide) topped a host of categories including Best Value, Best French Fries, Best Breakfast Sandwich, Most Child Friendly and Best Drive-Thru.

This year's champ for Best Burger is Five Guys Burgers & Fries. In second place is cult-favorite In-N-Out Burger, followed by Wendy's where it's 'hip to be square' (burger patties), Burger King and McDonald's.

Private Label products are key drivers of the grocerant ready-2-eat and heat-N-eat niche.

Trader Joe’s, Whole Foods, TGI Fridays, Boston Market, Sheetz, Wawa and Walgreen’s all have entered the branded private label ready-2-eat and heat-N-eat fresh and prepared food grocerant niche. Each is finding success while rolling out additional meal components. Consumers have responded positively, in fact the entire food industry is taking notice.

Thom Bilschok global president, innovation and strategy for SymphonyIRI stated while speaking about IRI’s new survey “Accelerating Growth in Uncertain Times” that “ meal ingredients and components together make up the “hottest supercategory” … We’re projecting that meal ingredients are going to grow over double digits for 2011 and 2012,” he said. “Shoppers continue to [struggle] with expenditures.

Success leaves clues and Blischok went on to make a number of suggestions. “Within meal ingredients/components, retailers should invest in flavor innovation. “People are getting tired of eating the same old meatloaf — they’d like to try a different kind of meatloaf,” he noted. “So if I were a retailer, I would do two things: I would make sure shoppers understood that I’m there to help them make a simpler, better-quality, more value-driven meal than in the past; and I would be doing some private brand innovation around flavors and taste.” Regular readers of this blog are not surprised by this at all.

Monday, September 5, 2011

LABOR DAY

Enjoy the Holiday

Friday, September 2, 2011

Hand Held food continues to gain popularity.

In NPD Group’s 2011 report on Eating Patterns in America famed food industry research and speaker Harry Balzer found that Hand Held food lead the category of which food we ate more of this year than ever before both at home and at restaurants.

The foods and beverages U.S. consumers ate more of last year than ever before:

In-Home Meals

Pizza

Fruit
Salty Snacks
Yogurt

Restaurant-Purchased Meals
Breakfast Sandwiches

Hot Cereal
Snacks Burritos

Regular readers of this blog will not surprise by Mr. Balzer findings on Hand Held foods. What we found most interesting is he confirmed our findings with regards to Ready-2-eat and Heat-N-eat fresh and prepared food. He found …”While consumers are less likely to use a "fresh" product to prepare dinner at home than they have been since NPD began tracking this in 1985”.

Meal assembly is another recurring theme on this blog. Clearly retailers must react to consumer demand for fresh prepared ready-2-eat and heat-N-eat in order to maintain consumer relevance.

Thursday, September 1, 2011

Convenience-stores branded foodservice programs to outperform restaurant industry again.

Leveraging legacy locations, convenience, speed of service while integrating branded fresh prepared ready-2-eat and heat-N-eat prepared food; convenience stores are garnering customers from both the restaurant and grocery sectors.

Convenience stores foodservice offerings have largely been over looked or dismissed by Quick Service Restaurant chain operators and grocery stores. Following the lead of Wawa, Sheetz, Rutters and now 7 Eleven the convenience store sector is branding food programs from coast to coast. More importantly they are garnering a lager share of stomach with improving food quality, healthful offerings and speed of service that quite frankly QSR’s can’t keep up with.

David Sprinkle, publisher of Packaged Facts stated "By enhancing foodservice quality and variety, we believe convenience stores are poised to benefit from increased sales of gasoline and other merchandise, as consumers seek to consolidate their purchases in the interest of efficiency"…"Because it is so well positioned, we anticipate that convenience store industry foodservice sales growth will outperform the retail and restaurant foodservice industry average through 2013."

In fact Packaged Facts projects that convenience store foodservice sales grew 6% in 2010, and will rise an additional 6% in 2011 and 5% in 2012.