The Politics of the Plate

Lamb shanksLamb shanks are back on the menu and trendier than ever. According to trend analysts, Chris Sanderson and Martin Raymond from The Future Laboratory in the UK, gastro-thrift ideals and traditional home-style cuisine are in vogue.

Food is an enormous industry with ever changing standards and perceptions. Design contributes across many levels in the industry from interior design and architecture to branding, product design and industrial design and can be a critical factor to business success.

Chris and Martin, co-authors of the new book CrEATe (November 2008, Gestalten), recently provided an insight into some of the forces shaping contemporary trends in the food industry that are influencing the likes and dislikes of consumers, generating opportunities for business and designers to work collaboratively. CrEATe considers some of these trends – and design’s response.

There is less confidence in where food comes from – people are wanting to know how it got from A to B. Consumers today are contemplating issues such as food miles, fair trade, obesity and organic food farming and production and the food production industry is scrutinised as we question the environmental impact and ethics of the food on our plates. Shoppers are showing their attitude to food by purchasing organics and choosing products that promote the ethical treatment of animals.

A want of good quality ingredients, value for money and a determination to ‘waste not, want not’ sees consumers shopping in tune with the seasons and seeking out less expensive and lesser known cuts of meat. Home-style simplicity and traditionalism have become fashionable; in restaurants, wholehearted dining is sought after and with less time spent at home eating meals, cooking at home is considered an occasion more special and enjoyable than previously.

There is a trend towards functional foods: consumers are opting for foods that offer extra therapeutic and health giving properties. Breads, eggs, juices, water and sweets are but a few types of food that manufacturers are packing full of extra antioxidants, ‘programming’ with nanotechnology and enriching with anti-stress, beauty boosting, disease-preventative and mood enhancing ingredients. Manufacturers of traditionally unhealthy junk foods are giving their products a makeover. The ‘superfood’ market is considered niche but is expected to grow exponentially as more consumers choose to ‘eat to live’.

Design is seizing the opportunities these trends present in products - coming up with new packaging concepts and creating brands and communications that appeals to the food-functional or thrifty consumers; in processes – working throughout the supply chain to create more sustainable and ethical methods of farming, transportation and packaging; and in places – in the evolution of architecture and interior design of cafes, restaurants and supermarket, responsive to attitudinal changes.

Whet your appetite

Preshafruit bottles“I’ll have an apple juice, please.”

“Would that be a glass of Granny Smith or Royal Gala?”

This is not the future of fruit juice – it’s here and now. Preshafruit is a range of fresh fruit juices and mixes that occupies a niche in the market. Using High Pressure Processing (HPP) to create its fruit mixes – as opposed to heat pasteurisation, the standard process in the industry – ensure more vitamins, minerals and enzymes are retained and the taste unique to each apple variety captured.

Melbourne-base graphic design agency, Design by Pidgeon, was engaged to communicate the benefits and points of differentiation of the product in the packaging to stand out in a highly competitive market. Launched in late 2008 the range is now stocked in over 400 Woolworths supermarkets in Victoria and New South Wales and is being exported to Singapore and Hong Kong.

Hungry for more?

Somage Chamellia teaSomage Fine Foods, a small Melbourne-based food manufacturer, secured a major distributor, 40 new customers and doubled its existing customer orders after it engaged marketing, brand and design agency Taylor & Grace to help the company tap into the burgeoning consumer organic market.

In this Design Victoria Business Immersion, Taylor & Grace created a unique packaging concept and evocative brand to communicate the essence of the product; its values, personality and reputation, to the retail market. Product sales rocketed and Somage secured 40 new retail customers, of which several were from New Zealand – a market the company had just begun to develop.

Stay tuned

In an upcoming Design Victoria Business Immersion case study to feature on our website, a prominent Victorian food retailer collaborates with an industrial designer to produce an innovative, sustainable packaging concept for the take away food market.

*Elmwood Design brought Chris Sanderson and Martin Raymond from The Future Laboratory to Melbourne in early 2009 to speak about the future of food and design.

Read more

Click here to download the Somage and Taylor & Grace Business Immersion case study.
Click here to download the Preshafruit and Design By Pigdeon case sudy.
Click here to access Design Victoria's case study database.

Related Links

CrEATe - visit Gestalten publishing – www.gestalten.com
Elmwood Design – www.elmwood-design.com.au

11 March 2009


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