Man, I’ve written so many articles about food brands — and every single time, I’m able to add some thoughts about what each one could do better to reduce food confusion. But the folks at Vital Farms may have just stumped me. They seem to be doing every single thing, right! I had a conversation with Dan Brooks, Director of Brand Communications and Design at Vital Farms. He told me, in the beginning, research proved people were confused about, “Cage-free,” “Free range” and “Pasture-raised.” According to Dan, “People thought these terms meant pretty much the same thing. When, in [...]
Consumers are confused enough about nutrition. Don’t let your packaging make the problem worse. What’s my proof this is a huge problem? All I have to do is visit a food brand trade show. For instance, during my most recent trip to the 800-pound gorilla in the food trade show world, Natural Products Expo West, I saw the same product over and over, in every aisle, in every category. I call this product, “Huh?” Of course, it wasn’t one product — but it seemed that way, thanks to the fact that, while the vast majority of exhibitors have gotten [...]
Last week, Impossible Foods debuted the second version of their plant-based “Impossible Burger” at CES 2019. That’s right. A food company at a tech conference. The context makes sense if you already know about Impossible Foods, a company dedicated to finding innovative ways to create meatless meat, that actually tastes like the real thing. Forget about robots and rollable TVs — the Impossible Burger 2.0 was the clear favorite at this year’s conference, stepping up their original recipe in both flavor and texture. So I’ve been wondering, is Impossible Burger actually making “food as technology” palatable for consumers? Right now, [...]
I’d forgotten about cottage cheese, but when I re-realized this stuff could fill some holes in my protein game, I went looking and found, in my shiny-happy Whole Foods, good culture (lower case intentional), a new, better, bright light. And I gobbled it up. good culture, while its lower case font wreaks havoc with my computer’s auto-correct, is really as the name says, “good.” Love the taste, the story, the peel off paper wrap that contains more info — pretty much everything. But since my thing is all about how food brands can increase loyalty by reducing food confusion, [...]
I LOVE Lesser Evil Paleo Puffs — especially the “No Cheese” Cheesiness variety. Apparently, lots of people feel good about every variety of the brand’s miraculous grain-free extrusions, since, whenever I arrive at what’s become my favorite Whole Foods facings, it looks as though some enormous, puff-loving creature has taken a swipe through the entire set. And the good goes so far beyond the stuff in the package. So pull open a bag and let’s dig in to everything that makes Lesser Evil so much less evil: Their story goes beyond what’s become trite (albeit true) and commoditized storytelling [...]
Skeptics will look at what Kraft is doing (and what I’m doing by writing about it) and say, “Oh, they’re just trying to get people to buy more of their products.” I say, “So what?” We’re all in the business of persuading consumers to buy our stuff, which means we’re all looking for opportunities to stand out. And thankfully, opportunities like this don’t come around every day. So while Kraft is putting itself out there to help an estimated 800,000 people/families affected by this government shutdown — and now, asking other brands to pitch in, what could this awful [...]
The folks at BeeFree reached out, asking if I’d like to try their products — what followed was a BIG box of their Warrior Mix and the offer of more. Could my miniscule blog help them? I don’t think they really cared — maybe they were simply being, as their name suggests, sweet. The story is authentic and human. Jennifer Wiese’s oldest son had just been diagnosed with Autism. And while these kids are said to be “on the spectrum,” I’d imagine Jennifer and her husband were too — on an emotional spectrum between disbelief and desperation. Jennifer decided [...]