Q&A Bryan Murphy, UK sales director, Dawn Farms

What challenges do you see the industry facing today?

It does appear that we are living through a perfect storm of uncertainty in relation to climate, geopolitics, inflation, and threats of recession. The mood music has changed and is a little more upbeat in the last months than it was towards the close of 2022. In times like this, the focus is on ensuring you have the fundamentals in place and our focus and investment are on supply chain security, food quality and safety, insight led innovation and increasingly our sustainability credentials.

We believe that these pillars are more important than ever today to protect ours and our customers’ brand integrity. As a business who supply the UK’s leading QSR’s and sandwich/food to go manufacturers, we continue to look ahead to ensure we meet the changing needs and behaviours of their consumers.

Plant-based food has been in the spotlight, but what of meat ingredients?

Our focus is on staying relevant, credible, and distinctive in the eyes of our B2B customers. We do that by consistently providing great tasting protein as the hero ingredients in their products. Our expertise is in in the development and application of fully cooked, ready to eat proteins (meat and plant based) in different settings from manufacturing to QSR counters.

Meat protein remains by far the preferred option in the market but of course there is a growing number of “flexitarians” willing to swap out one protein for another, but crucially they will not compromise on taste and texture. When you couple those product attributes with solid sustainability credentials (we are signed up members of the Science Based Targets initiative) and the experience and expertise developed over 37 years in the business then you have strong selling proposition to serious industry players.

So, offering the consumer variety and choice is paramount, be it plant-based, meat or a blended product - it needs to taste great and look great. For our customers, in a challenging labour and energy market, it needs to be hasslefree, ready to eat and play its role as part of a pizza, pasta dish, sandwich or ready meal.

Are consumers’ habits and demands changing due to this ‘perma-crisis’? What are they looking for?

A previous ONS survey revealed that more than 80% of UK adults had already started the move towards carving out a healthier lifestyle. Today, as the cost of living crisis bites into budgets, it’s also driving change in consumer habits and preferences. As a business, we recognise that consumers health and sustainability beliefs are being fragmented. People are trying to do the right thing by their health and the planet, and meat is playing a part in this.

Three in four consumers want to eat healthy and great tasting food, however, few are willing to compromise on taste over health. Taste is what keeps consumers coming back and meat delivers consistently on taste and texture.

An opportunity exists for brands to utilise the positive health attributes of meat, with health call outs such as high in vitamin B12 and high in protein. Brands are responding, as the taste, quality and convenience expectations of consumers continues to increase. This dynamic makes the category an interesting space, and ripe for opportunity. For our part, our Innovation team in Dawn Farm Foods and TMI, comprised of culinary chefs, food scientists and technologist, design recipes in our innovation kitchen, which can be scaled to meet the needs and demands of our customers, while ensuring there is zero compromise in flavour, taste, or texture.

Is there opportunity in change as consumers trade down?

Price has always been a factor in the UK market, but we have to recognise that supply chain disruption and inflation has occurred due to mainly external factors mentioned earlier. We see a battle for the “out of home” as retail brands invest in product innovation to attract customers away from restaurants and delivery. Consumers are seeking value for money and as reported by the Grocer “they may trade down from recognised high street branded cafés into meal deals”. This opens an opportunity to replicate such quality, whilst maintaining affordability. To this point, we do see that innovation focused on “permissible indulgence” is an increasing opportunity for brands.

What kind of trends and consumer demand are impacting product development?

There are many ways brands can add value to the consumer in 2023, as scrutiny increases. Trends and consumer demand impacting NPD in the year ahead may place a greater emphasis on sustainability, better-foryou options, ‘newstalgia’, bold fusions and authenticity.

Sustainability and ‘better for you’ foods continue to see growth in food to go as they address the demand for guilt free, convenient, and easy ways to dine. It is reported that the Gen Z consumer will pay an average premium of 9% for more environmentally friendly offers. Interest in nostalgia is growing too, as consumers seek familiarity and comfort in uncertain times. There will be a twist on this which will deliver a fresher take on classic favourites.

We expect emerging cuisines such as Mexican and Asian to inspire blended inspirations creating new and fun combinations. Younger consumers are engaging ever more with food and culture, they want to travel the world at their table. Authentic recipes and techniques are driving premiumisation, as they seek to experiment with more regional nuanced dishes.

As a business, Dawn Farms has to be agile in how it meets the demands of different customer groups. We deliver customised solutions to many leading global brands, and we deliver ready to order options for all customers via our Batch 85 range of signature meat products and our Plant Deli portfolio of plant based proteins. Our promise to all customers is the secure and consistent supply of safe, high quality food products, products that are created with passion for our customers that protect and enhance their own brand trust and position with their consumers in these complex times.