Issue 5, May 2022
Welcome to Issue 5 of Insightful Bites, our round-up of all the latest trends and insights in the world of food and drink to get your teeth into!
Cost-of-Living rise: an opportunity for food retailers
A survey by Kantar has suggested that nine out of 10 Brits are concerned about the rapidly rising cost of groceries. It’s the highest rate of inflation seen since May 2009.
There’s plenty of opportunity for retailers looking to respond to this and be seen to be supporting their community of shoppers. One example is Iceland, who this month are claiming a UK supermarket first by offering a discount for over-60s in response to recent figures from Age UK suggesting three-quarters of older people are worried about the rising cost of living. Every Tuesday from 24 May, shoppers aged 60 and over will be able to claim a 10% discount on their shopping in Iceland and The Food Warehouse stores.
Speciality Food reported on how the economic squeeze could provide an opportunity for local independent retailers with consumers avoiding using their car because of high fuel costs and instead embracing localism. Another consequence may be that consumers cut back on eating out and instead look to cook at home and buy quality ingredients to create premium dishes as treats, which could be good news for fine food retailers.
How one supermarket is growing online sales
Growing online sales has become the ultimate quest in the digital age and it seems that businesses are becoming increasingly creative when it comes to how they do this.
Take Co-op. They have announced that they will roll out ‘walking deliveries’ – which will see staff deliver online orders to customer homes on foot – to 200 stores this year. According to The Grocer, The supermarket has revealed that its goal is to grow its online business revenue by a further 50% to £300m by the end of this year, continuing 36 consecutive months of growth to date.
HFSS: What does the Government U-turn on multibuys mean for healthy brands?
So, the latest Government U-turn on multibuys has caused a furore with the health lobby and healthier brands. But does this mean that healthy brands have missed their chance? Not all is lost for the non-HFSS brands, as the opportunity to feature on gondola ends and other promotional spaces near checkouts is still on the table, making impulse purchases – arguably more important for boosting sales and trial – of healthier foods more likely. Restrictions on HFSS foods are set to come into play from October.
Food & Drink out of this world…
Now for something out of this world… introducing OneRare, the world’s first fully-fledged metaverse for the food industry, where you can watch a cookery display from a top chef, bag a table at a leading restaurant or pick up a few ‘NFT ingredients’ at a grocery store and much more, without ever leaving your house!
While the likes of Burger King are experimenting with NFTs as the next iteration of loyalty schemes, smaller brands can start to understand how the future might include using the metaverse as a marketing tool.
If the metaverse, NFT’s (Non-Fungible Tokens) and Web3, all sound like a foreign language then we can highly recommend that you read this article in The Grocer.
Hot new foodie destination to open in November
Back to planet Earth, and according to The Sunday Times Style Barometer, chef Margot Henderson of hip east London restaurant, Rochelle Canteen, is heading to Somerset, the fashion set’s favourite county, for her first pub with rooms. The Three Horseshoes, opening this November in Batcombe, a 15-minute drive from Bruton (Stella McCartney and Phoebe Philo live in the area), is being tipped as the hottest opening of the year.
Our pick of the Platinum Jubilee product launches….
As we head into the Jubilee bank holiday to celebrate 70 years of Her Majesty on the throne, we’re spotlighting some of our favourite Jubilee food and drink products that are fit for a right Royal celebration!
We’re loving:
- Morrison’s Clarence the Corgi cake – a fun royal take on the classic “caterpillar celebration cake” format.
- Silent Pool’s Platinum Celebration Gin – simply stunning.
- Biscuiteers Corgi and Crown Biscuits – look too good to eat.
Inside Sharp HQ…
Check out all the latest news and food and drink campaigns from Sharp HQ here.
