Ubiquitous Consumption

Image courtesy of Will Lion Flickr

The Future Internet: Service Web 3.0 Video

Some questions

• Watch the video link above in full then replay. What questions does it bring up for food providers and consumers?

• What is the ubiquitous web?

• Can you locate articles that link with and explain this future scenario further?

• Who does the 'Internet of things' best serve? How might it function?
  

• How will accessing products anywhere anytime change food marketing? Packaging design? Farming practices? Transportation?
  

• How will it change food production?

• How might it impact on the environment?
  

• Will it change human culture? Why/not? If so how?
  

• Who else will be effected by this future web? In what ways?
  

Twizza Hut

Image courtesy of TCM Hitchhiker

Tweeting Becomes a Summer Job Option - NYTimes.com

Today I found this link via @NLearning on Twitter. Pizza Hut is advertising a job for a Summer Twittern (a summer intern who uses Twitter).

This looks to be both a preemptive and defensive publicity move by Pizza Hut, following on from recent bad publicity wreaked by former employees of Dominos Pizza chain on Youtube.

Monitoring Twitter for feedback and simultaneously marketing in 140 characters job applicants must "demonstrate social-media skills through some kind of creative response". Pizza Hut anticipate plenty of YouTube video uploads from savvy students vying for this unique opportunity.

Some Questions

• How does this reflect on your social media practices? Do you think using social media will assist your prospective employment opportunities? Why/why not?
  

• How else might Twitter/micro blogging be used for food marketing? Give 3 examples.

• How should Dominos Pizza have best responded?

• Can you envision applying for work by uploading a Youtube video? Why/why not?

Lesson Idea

• Create a 3 minute video application for your dream (hospitality) job. Who are you directing it to? What do you know about them? How can you further find out about this person? Who else might know? Who can you ask? How? What qualities do you think are needed for the job? How do you best meet these yourself? What qualities do you still need to develop?
  

BakerTweet Piped Hot!

BakerTweet broadcasts a local baker's freshly baked produce to their nearby hungry followers using a (bakery proof) box that transmits wirelessly to Twitter. Some like it hot!

clipped from www.bakertweet.com Baker Tweet Lovely, layered bloomers, french baguettes, sourdough, traditional bridge, and many more breads, still steaming 17 minutes ago from Albion's oven It was made by Poke. We're a digital creative agency based across the road from the Albion and, perhaps selfishly, we wanted a way to get the freshest baked stuff first. Then we realised it could be a great tool for bakers everywhere.

Smell The Future of Search

Image courtesy of WasabiNoise Flickr
The DaVinci Institute - The Future of Libraries

Search Technology is to become more complicated...

Beyond image, text, video and audio search, future thinker Thomas Frey writes that taste, smell, texture, reflectivity, opacity, mass, density, tone, speed, and volume will all become search able attributes.

Some Questions

• How might this impact on Food bloggers?

• Food markets?

• Food Products?

• Who else?
  

Cadbury Dairy Milk Bars Fairtrade

Image courtesy of publik15 Flickr
Cadbury builds Fairtrade awareness, bar-by-bar
Fairtrade sourcing is moving mainstream as business responds to the ethical climate shift that consumers are leading. For Cadbury this means that their milk chocolate dairy bars only will be sourced from Fairtrade cocoa beans. The recently formed Cadbury Cocoa Partnership mediates the certification process for Ghanaian farming cooperatives to ensure Fairtrade traceability, accountability and transparency.

Some questions

• In your own product development are there ingredients that can be sourced as Fairtrade? Why/not?
• If they were available how would Fairtrade ingredients effect your marketing campaign?
  
• Why do you personally think Fairtrade is going mainstream? What social, global, economic, environmental factors are contributing to such a shift in the marketing of goods?
• Where is Cadbury's sourcing their dark cocoa from?
• What would it take for Cadbury's to fully source Fairtrade?
• How do you personally feel about eating chocolate that is Fairtrade vs non Fairtrade?
• Just today ask people around you if they buy Fairtrade and which products?
• What would help you to buy more Fairtrade?

A Customised Food Bar? C/o the Niche Web!

Image Courtesy of MontanaRaven
Flickr


Customized Nutrition Bars - You Bar - Build-a-Bar

The current trend for bespoke and DIY customisation is the direct result of the web's long tail. The Long Tail is ecommerce jargon for how unique and individual products are served to the masses via websites. There are enough people searching for unique niche products that somewhere someone can cater for them and still make money. As well consumers and producers can collaborate because costs on the web are lower and both access and exchange is so immediate.

Amazon has this business model-they provide books that may only get a few searches a day but the totality of all those rare book sales make up the majority of Amazon's overall revenue.

In the You Bar DIY mass customisation business model, customers build their own energy bars. First choose the base from a range of nut butters. Next add up to 3 protein powders, 2 seeds/nuts, add dried fruit/berries, sweeteners, tasty extra options (chocolate), grains, fibre or vitamin infusions, special requests and many further customised options available.

Name your bar and receive a box full to give to your friends!

Some Questions

• How might this business model be applied to your own food product ideas?

• If this is a model that appeals to you then locate 3 more examples.

• How might you take this business model Offline?
  

• Does it lend itself to bespoke packaging design? How? Why/not?

• What other questions does this idea raise in your mind? Note them down in your blog and go ask an expert foodie/blogger.

Food Market Research

Centro Commercial Food Market, originally uploaded by auntjojo.

Growers, chefs and factories market their food to those customers who really want to buy their products. Market Research enables food producers to create products that their customers will buy. Alot of this research is interviewing, polling and observing customer's buying and eating habits. Sophisticated software including data visualisation tools have sped up and refined this consumer information gathering process.

HealthFocus International Trendscan. This 2007 USA report has been compiled by a team of market researchers for the food and beverage industry. This group particularly focus on consumer health and nutrition. The HealthFocus Trendscan is a biennial publication this is a source from which food media reports . The 2009 report is yet to come out however . It will cost $US thousands. Instead use Basic Trend Search and Beyond Basic Trend Search to discover for yourself what might be covered in Trendscan 2009.

In summary-HealthFocus has identified 7 major areas of interest in health and wellness in the 2007 HealthFocus Trend Study.

The areas tracked are:
1) The Pursuit of Balance in Life & Diet, Daily Energy & Stress Reduction
2) Growth of Functional Foods & Functional Ingredients
3) Interest in Organic, Sustainability & Fair Trade
4) Weight Management
5) Food Safety Concerns
6) Well-being of Kids
7) Prevention & CAM (Complementary and Alternative Medicine)

Lesson Idea DIY Trend Scan

Coca-Cola craves health drink market

Coca-Cola could launch stevia drink ahead of FDA GRAS

Wacko! This is stunning news, Stevia could well be mainstream already. This is a tricky ingredient to balance in cooking because by force of habit we equate it to sugar-which it is not.
Use extremely sparingly like one sixteenth (less?) of a t spoon maximum. The thing is if you find the right amount you will have sweet baked goods, drinks etc fit for any diabetic sweet tooth. But if you over do it the over powering flavour could put you off Stevia altogether. Dont be put off! It is beneficial for you! A Calorie free sweetener, the benefits of replacing sugar are systemic. It reduces blood pressure and has antibacterial, antiviral, and antifungal properties. I have yet to give up sugar, but if Stevia were more readily available commercially then I could do it.

Stevia
Much sweeter than sugar. Stevioside, a chemical that makes up 6-18% of the leaf, is 100 times sweeter than a 10% solution of sucrose. Originally from Paraguay.

Image from Ecolibrary
http://ecolibrary.cs.brandeis.edu/index.php