Taste Tomorrow: Being familiar with consumption trends is the key to success

Zoltán Poór
managing director
Puratos Hungary

Bakery and confectionery ingredient maker Puratos Group is the Belgian parent company of Puratos Hungary Zrt., and it has 69 affiliates and employs 9,100 people – the group is the biggest such enterprise in the world. Recently they have conducted their third ‘Taste Tomorrow’ survey in 41 countries, with 18,000 consumers filling out the online questionnaire. The survey identified 9 main future trends, and in this article we are going to introduce 3 of these. However, we will share the full study with the customers of Puratos Hungary next year.

Taste-Health-Freshness: There is nothing new about these three trends remaining the most influential in shaping shopper decisions. Freshness has the biggest impact on shopper decisions when buying bakery items, while taste matters the most when purchasing cakes and pastries. Taste: 80 percent of European consumers still prefer traditional flavours, but 60 percent of them would be happy to try the exotic flavours from countries far away. 63 percent of shoppers like products that are composed of different textures.

Health: Consumers think of healthy products as something that contain more fibres, protein, various kind of nuts and seeds, but there is less salt, sugar and fat in them. As for chocolates, it is high cocoa content that characterises healthy products. Seven from 10 consumers reckon that cocoa content not only correlates to the taste experience, but also to beneficial health effects. Surprisingly one third of European respondents think food products won’t be healthier in 2030. Freshness: The fresher a product is, the higher quality it represents – shoppers say. Freshness should be made visible to shoppers. With frozen and packed products it is a real challenge to do this. It is noteworthy that only 19 percent of consumers expect groceries to be fresher in 2030. For more information visit www.tastetomorrow.com. //