1. New priorities for beaten-up consumers: People today are expressing entirely new — and more complex — sets of concerns. Now they’re focusing inward. Their concerns are personal, emotional and ethical. The economy has people scared and they’re looking for a “safe harbor.” The consultants advise hotels and restaurants to lure these hunkered down consumers from their psychological storm cellars by replicating the “campfire experience” — building emotional ties and connecting to communities. They need to audit their businesses based on next year’s hot buttons: economic survival, reassurance, intimacy and friendship, feeding my knowledge, feeding my emotions, artisan/hand-made, neighborhood/local, authentic/real, comfort and safety.
2. Putting focus on the left side of the menu: That’s where the emotional resonance is. Look for more creative snacky things, more small plates, more portion options…things sized for one, for two, for a crowd. This isn’t just a small plates phenomenon, because it isn’t about the size of the plate. Sharing is the key, sharing responds to consumers’ needs for comfort and safety, for intimacy and friendship.
3. Upscaling the downscale: Consumers are trading down in order to trade up. That’s what’s behind the explosion of “gourmet” hamburgers smothered in the likes of manchego cheese and Iberian ham, or artisan hot dogs and Kobe dogs served with goat cheese and guacamole or home-made relishes, or french fries revved up with parmesan cheese and truffle oil.
4. Fresh = local = hand-made = safer = better: Baum & Whiteman believe the words “organic” and “natural” are diluted (polluted, actually) by big-brand food companies, so they’re being replaced in consumers’ minds by “fresh” and “local” and “hand-made.” People are looking for edibles they can trust, and for food communities that stand personally behind their products. Restaurants and hotels are spotlighting house-made or locally-made bread, artisan-cured salami, chef-pickled vegetables, locally-butchered beef, honey made from nearby hives, foods purchased from regional farms — all these theoretically reflecting sustainability and helping local farmers and being better for the environment.
5. Fried chicken is the new pork belly: The new trend is fried chicken — crisped in all sorts of inventive ways by lowly diner cooks and exalted chefs alike. Ahead of the curve: Korean fried chicken, invisibly coated, amazingly flavorful and fried twice for ultra-crunch, moving out of traditional Korean-towns into mainstream neighborhoods.
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