European Trend Food Report

http://www.gdi.ch/en/Think-Tank/Publications/European-Food-Trends-Report/674

Bits over Bites: Food Consumption in a Digital World
Languages: German, English
Authors: Mirjam Hauser, David Bosshart, Bettina Höchli, Jaël Borek, Christopher Muller

Organic, local and fresh: the importance of these qualities in food offerings has been growing for years. As everyday life becomes steadily more mobile and flexible, the average European demands greater authenticity, naturalness and transparency in all matters relating to food.

Digitalisation is at hand to help, developing new solutions all the time: many of the new offerings employ technology to enable better access to fresh, local, organic products. Silicon Valley has taken the lead in bringing digitalisation to the food sector.

Investors are focusing in particular on delivery services covering the last mile, i.e., getting the customer's order to the front door. New start-ups, some of them from outside the sector, e.g. Uber and Instacart, are challenging established actors and changing the world of food – radically. Everything is being remixed: who makes, processes, distributes and consumes what how. The future of the food supply chain in a nutshell is: bits dominate bites.

Notwithstanding the growing appeal of digital offerings, in the physical world people still look for the social element, sensuousness and inspiration. What does the tension between these demands mean for producers and providers? How can the food industry react to the transformation of the supply chain? What trends are emerging at the interface of digital and analogue?