Monthly Archives: November 2021

The UK is a nation of alcohol drinkers, 46% drink full strength alcohol twice per week or more (Attest Apr 2021)

The UK is also however on a mission to moderate their drinking, 6 in 10 people in the UK are actively moderating or feel like they probably should (Attest Apr 2021), and moderation behaviour varies most significantly by alcohol consumption, i.e., the more frequently someone drinks, the more they recognise they ‘should’ moderate, but aren’t.

The reasons for moderation centre around health, wellness & cost, health manifests in a range of ways; mental & physical, short term & long term, externally & internally motivated, and fewer consumers seem concerned about hangovers as a primary reason for moderation.

Categories that match with this trend (focusing on low sugar, low calories, low ABV) are growing in value rapidly… in the year to 23^rd October 2021, total GB coverage (Neilson); Non-Alcoholic Beers grew by 19%,Hard Seltzer grew by 246% & Non-Alcoholic Spirits grew by 107%.

 The underlying motivations to drink alcohol are emotive & physiological – the desire for the ‘feeling’, improved mood, fun, enhanced socials & escapism, however in those occasions where people are moderating their consumption, often the only alternative available is soft drinks which cannot credibly bridge the emotion gap and so they feel like an experiential sacrifice.

Non-alcoholic drinks fill the gap between desire (Alcohol) and compromise (Soft Drinks), offering consumers that high quality premium alcohol experience without the negative impact of alcohol.

There is considerable demand for Non-Alcoholic spirits in the On-Premise; of those who drunk an alcoholic drink of any kind in the last year, have visited an on-premise venue more than 3 times in the last month and would consider purchasing a Non-alcoholic spirit in a restaurant, pub, bar or club (Attest Apr 2021), 85% agree that Non-Alcoholic spirits should be more widely available & 87% agree that Non-Alcoholic cocktails should be more widely available and given the surge in cocktail demand post lockdown this has to be a huge open goal for category management teams across the on-premise who are looking to enhance cash margin whilst surprising & delighting their guests, the risk to inaction on operators drinks menu’s is consumer apathy and a default to tap water which of course delivers no upside for either party.

The category barriers:

• Taste… consumers have been disappointed historically with the quality of ‘liquid on lips’ across many brands, however CleanCo have achieved a breakthrough on liquid with Omega Gin to such a degree that no other Non-Alcoholic spirit has achieved the holy grail of beating a premium full-strength gin on a ‘blind taste’ challenge.
• Confusion … CleanCo has made it very easy for consumers to understand the proposition & navigate drinks menus, eg; ‘if you like gin, it’s like gin’ and ‘go clean’ on a G&T or Margarita, in addition bartenders favour the brand as they are able to direct consumers with ease on menu as it sits alongside the full strength serve.
• Familiarity … CleanCo is the leading independent non-alcoholic spirit brand in the off-premise and are investing significantly in marketing, advertising & sampling across the on & off-premise.

Meeting consumer expectations around taste, flavour and quality of serve will be uber critical, operators that choose the most compelling brands will drive a greater frequency of visit and spend.

Driverless Vehicles can’t arrive soon enough, really?

Why it matters: Ports are backed up and there aren’t enough truck drivers to get all the containers where they need to be, leading to product shortages, inflation, and stressed retailers.

Driverless vehicles could theoretically be operating 24/7, moving freight from clogged ports to retailers’ shelves more quickly and safely, while cutting delivery costs and carbon emissions too. 

It’ll be two or three years before autonomous vehicles are ready for commercial deployment on U.S. highways. But the first data-driven studies from early pilot programs suggest they’ll be substantially more efficient. 

TuSimple and UPS, for example, say their self-driving test vehicles achieved 13% fuel savings while racking up 160,000 autonomous highway miles in Arizona.

• “To get 13% fuel savings is unheard of,” TuSimple CEO Cheng Lu said recently that the gain would be worth billions of dollars for the U.S. trucking industry.
• Fuel accounts for 24% of the cost per mile for heavy-duty trucks, second to labour, at 42%, per the American transportation institute.
• TuSimple’s system drives more smoothly and efficiently than a human driver, Lu explains. “How you operate the truck has a very big impact on fuel economy. It’s a great validation of the maturity of our technology.” 

Another study by Georgia Tech found that Ryder Systems’ new autonomous transfer hub networks — combining self-driving trucks on highways with conventional trucking operations for the first and last miles — could save shippers up to 40%. 

• “Today I have to wait to get another driver. There’s a lot of lost time in the transfer of goods,” says Ryder executive vice president Karen Jones, who heads up new product development. “This has the promise to keep everything moving around the clock.” 

Reduced labour costs account for much of the savings, of course. But optimising routes to reduce miles driven with an empty trailer is another big factor, the study found. 

What they’re saying: “The reality is that America like the UK simply does not have enough truck drivers.

The U.S. driver shortage stands at 80,000 today and is on track to double by 2030, according to the American trucking association while the UK’s most recently published shortfall was circa 100,000.

• The shortage leaped during the pandemic, when demand for shipped goods soared just as the industry saw a surge in early retirements.
• Einride, a Swedish company, says its technology could make truck driving a more attractive desk job.

Where it stands: A handful of autonomous trucking firms continue to make progress toward highway deployment, including Waymo, Aurora, Embark and Kodiak. 

• One company, Gatik, has begun making short driverless runs for Walmart on a fixed urban route in Bentonville, Arkansas. 

What to watch: TuSimple’s signalled it is close to testing its trucks without a human safety operator on public highways before the end of this year.

This notion would have been dismissed only a couple of years ago but given the shortage of people to fulfil roles, nothing is off the cards now and it will be fascinating to see if distribution networks this side of the Atlantic commence meaningful trials.

One thing for sure, distribution will simply not contract back to how it operated pre-covid. 

Vegan cuisine is popping up in two places it wasn’t present before: fine dining and fast food.

Why it matters: The single biggest way an individual can reduce their carbon footprint is to eat less meat and dairy. Now, the popularisation of meatless meals could help curb meat consumption in the U.S which seemed improbable just a few years ago.

What’s happening: Plant-based diets are hitting both ends of the food spectrum. High-end eateries are putting out vegan tasting menus, and fast-food operators are serving up fried vegan chicken and meatless burgers.

• New York’s 3-Michelin star Eleven Madison Park made a statement when it reopened after its pandemic shutdown with a fully plant-based menu, at the same steep price of $335 per person. 
  • “The current food system is simply not sustainable, in so many ways,” chef Daniel Humm wrote in his re-opening letter. “It is time to redefine luxury as an experience that serves a higher purpose and maintains a genuine connection to the community.”
• And a slew of fast casual and fast-food restaurants are now serving vegan alternatives to their classics. Fuku — Momofuku’s fast food sister restaurant — has chicken-less versions of all its nuggets. Starbucks sells a sausage, egg, and cheese breakfast sandwich with Impossible meat.

“The world is just really changing now,” says Doug McNish, a vegan chef and author of several vegan cookbooks. 

• “As more and more people adopt this way of living, you see people of affluence — whether that’s thought leaders or influencers or celebrities or entrepreneurs — becoming plant-based. And then it just spreads like wildfire.”

We’ve grown accustomed to equating luxury with expensive meats and animal products, like lobster and foie gras, but vegan chefs are out to prove that plants can be luxurious too.

• “We have dishes on our menu that take a day and a half of labour to get onto the plate,” says Rich Landau, the chef behind an upscale vegan restaurant in Washington D.C. called Fancy Radish. “There is a lot of luxury in that.”
• “More people are starting to understand that food is about flavour, not flesh,” he says.

Chefs keep coming up with creative ways to replace animal products with plants. “When you manipulate vegetables right, you can apply the same fine dining cooking techniques to them as you would to meat,” McNish says.

• Examples include watermelon instead of ahi tuna in sushi rolls and poke bowls, or spiced jackfruit as pulled pork. 
• McNish serves up a king oyster mushroom calamari at one of his restaurants. The mushrooms are sliced thin, and the centre is punched out to resemble calamari, and then it’s deep-fried with the same flavours.

Let’s be fair, if the US can reduce meat consumption, then there is huge potential to materially swing the pendulum in the UK also.

Gen Z shoppers are driving a thrifting renaissance.

Why it matters: The apparel and footwear industry account for about 10% of climate impact — greater than all international flights and maritime shipping trips combined. Buying clothes, shoes and more second-hand can significantly reduce fashion’s carbon footprint.

The numbers: The second-hand market is projected to reach $77 billion by 2025 — up from $36 billion in 2021 — and is growing at 11 times the rate of the broader retail clothing sector, according to a report from the retail analytics firm Global Data and the online thrift store Thred Up. 

The drivers of the growth are younger consumers who are drawn to thrifting for its sustainability, eclectic and cool styles.

• Another growing part of the second-hand market is e-commerce, Platforms like Depop (90% of users are under 26 years old) and Poshmark have helped turn young shoppers into stylists who can make additional income.
• Scores of Gen Z consumers are setting up online stores to sell their stuff. And they’re judiciously advertising on Instagram and TikTok, furthering the hype around thrifting even more.

However: The rise of thrifting’s popularity among wealthier consumers — those who don’t need the thrift to build their wardrobes — is harming lower-income shoppers, The surge of interest is driving prices up and depleting inventory.

What to watch: Gen Z’s revival of second-hand fashion is a positive for bricks-and-mortar retail. Even though online thrift shops are gaining popularity, younger thrifters prefer physical stores. 

• It’s a weekend activity: Gather a group of friends and hit a string of thrift stores, digging through bins upon bins of random stuff to find the winners.
• “They like the thrill of the hunt”.