MENU MATTERS: CONSUMER NEEDS
Q&A: Menu Matters’ Trend Experts Discuss 2025 Consumer Needs
Maeve Webster and Mike Kostyo, President and Vice President, Menu Matters
Maeve Webster and Mike Kostyo are the brains behind Menu Matters, a food industry consultancy that works with brands to make sense of the overwhelming trend and data landscape. Each year they release their Consumer Need States Report, which takes the pulse of the consumer to understand what they need and want from the food industry in the year ahead. Here they discuss how they developed this year’s report and how these consumer needs will impact the dairy, deli, bakery, cheese, and overall supermarket foodservice industry:
Maeve Webster: A year ago we were having this same conversation, trying to understand what consumers were thinking as we headed into 2024. The theme that kept coming up at that time was that they just wanted the food industry to take care of them. They were anxious about the year ahead because it was an election year, there were these economic pressures they were dealing with, there were global issues in the news, the list went on and on.
Mike Kostyo: So we knew consumers were anxious and dealing with a lot of issues last year, but the problem was they also weren’t having great dining, cooking, or shopping experiences. They would tell us that service was poor at restaurants, but they were still being asked to tip constantly. Or that they saw prices rising at the grocery store, while at the same time products were shrinking. They felt like the industry didn’t have their back.
Maeve: That’s how we came up with 2024’s need state, which was, “Just take care of the consumer.”
Mike: We thought about it like it’s that inspirational quote you see on the wall in a fine dining restaurant kitchen – if the food industry has a mantra to keep on the office wall for year, what would it be?
Maeve: And we still have to take care of the consumer. That need still holds.
Mike: But we did see some changes in the consumer mindset as we head into 2025.
WHAT’S IN STORE | 2025
Maeve: We did. Namely, consumers are ready for some excitement and they are hopeful for the year ahead. In our research, we asked consumers which emotions they were feeling as we headed into 2025, and the top answer was “Hopeful.”
Mike: It was a theme that came up over and over again. Nearly 90% of consumers told us they want to see more food and beverage trends on menus next year. “Getting out of the house” was their number two goal for 2025, just after being healthy.
Maeve: All of that research developed into our 2025 Consumer Need, which is “Give me something new.” They’re ready for some new options and ideas, for a little excitement.
Mike: We can’t let innovation keep taking a back seat. Mintel found that food and beverage innovation had plummeted 50% since 2007. And it shows. One in every five consumers told us they think there are too many versions of the same product on store shelves.
Maeve: Or look at the relentless focus on nostalgia, where we keep going back to the well to release the same ideas over and over again. At a certain point you have to develop new ideas to be nostalgic about in the future.
Mike: So we have this core consumer need state, to give them something new, but then we developed five tactics to accomplish that based on the data and research we’ve been seeing. And the first one came out of some research that we did last summer around texture.
Maeve: We asked consumers which senses they prioritize during a food experience and 69% of consumers told us they prioritize taste, which came out on top. On the one hand that’s not surprising that taste is the most important factor in a food decision, but on the other hand there are over 30% of consumers who didn’t choose it as a top priority.
Mike: And then just behind taste was smell, which 61% of consumers said they prioritize, yet we still don’t focus on scent and aroma enough in the industry. When we asked consumers about food aromas that they love, they said things like cookies baking or
© 2025 International Dairy Deli Bakery Association
Menu Matters: Consumer Needs
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