A Service Design Approach to the Human Side of Food Services (Sept. 2017)

Course Leader: Paul Sternberg Supervisor: Roman Schoeneboom Ravensbourne College, London 11 September, 2017

To my mum...

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all who were there for me throughout my MDes journey.

First of all I would like to express my sincere gratitude to our course leader Paul Sternberg, subject leader Simon Gough and all of our tutors for taking us through the insightful MDes experience in Ravensbourne.

I would like to thank my supervisor Roman Schoeneboom for his generous help and advice in such a short period of time we had.

I would like to acknowledge and express my appreciation to Ravensbourne for granting me the Professor Robin Baker Scholarship.

Furthermore, I am very grateful to Melissa Sterry, for initially introducing me to Ravensbourne and for her generous advice and guidance throughout the year.

I would also like to extend my special thanks to all of the interviewees: Simon Stenning, Mark Scholfield, Martta Oliveira, Rob Maslin, Veronica Fossa, and Mike Barry, for making time for me out of their busy schedules and to everyone who were kind enough to participate in my questionnaire.

Personal thanks also to the whole MDes course mates as well as to all the close friends back home, who were there for me when I needed them for moral support and professional advice throughout the year.

Last but not least, I would like to thank my dear family for their unconditional love: my mum, Fazilet, for her incredibly positive moral support and mentoring with her professional intelligence, providing all the warmness, strength and courage throughout this year; my brother, Artun, for his presence and love whenever I needed him and for making me feel safe and at home; my aunt, Nukhet, for always encouraging me to do better and bigger, and for her patience and speedy guidance. They supported me in coming to London for my master’s degree right from the beginning and were there for me at all times. This research would have never been possible, if they weren’t there.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

List of Figures and Tables ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..……….. 3

1.0 Introduction

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…….... 4

1.1 The Problem ………………………………………………………………………………………….……………………………………………….... 4 1.2 Aims & Objectives …………………….…………………………………………………………………………………………..…………….... 5

2.0 Literature Review …………….…………………………………………………………………………………………..……………....

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2.1 Millennial Generation ………………….…………………………………………………………………………………..…………….... 5 2.1.1 Healthier Lifestyles ……………….…………………………………………………………………………………………..…………….... 6 2.1.2 Experiences over Ownership ……………………………………………………………………………………..…………….... 7 2.1.3 The Foodies ………..…………………….……………………………………………..…………………………………………..…………….... 8 2.2 Food in Context ……………………….…………………………………………………….…………………………………..…………….... 9 2.2.1 What Is Food and Where It Comes From ..……………………………………………………..…………….... 10 2.2.2 Food Is Not Just Food Anymore ..………………………………….……………………………………..…….……….... 11 2.2.3 Food and Eating Design ..……………………………………………………………..………….………………..…………….... 13 2.3 Service Design ..……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..………….... 15 2.3.1 What Is Service Design? ..………………………………………………………………….…………………………….…………... 15 2.3.1.1 User-Centricity ………………………………….………………………………………….………………………..…….……….... 17 2.3.1.2 Co-Creation ……………………………………….………………………………………….……………………..…...………….... 18 2.3.1.3 Holistic Approach ………………………….……………………………………….……………………..…..…………….... 18 2.3.2 Why Service Design? …………………………….………………………………………….………………………..……..……….... 19 2.3.3 How Service Design Is Relevant To This Research? …….……………..…………....…………….... 21

3.0 Methodology

…………………………….………………….....……………………………………………………………..…………….... 21

4.0 Findings, Discussion and Analysis

………………………….…..…….………………..…………….... 25

4.1 Food as a Fuel ..………………………….………………….....……………………...……………….………………………..…………….... 27 4.2 Food Is What Brings Us Together” ….....……………………...……………….………………………..…………….... 28

4.3 Food: A Tool for Inspiration, Discovery and Creativity ….…………………….…..…………….... 30 4.5 Food as an Experience ………….…………………...……………………...……………….………………………..…………….... 33 4.6 Food as a Potion for Immortality ……...……………………...……………….………………………..………..…….... 35 4.7 Understanding the User Is the Key ...……………………...…………….….………………………..…………..….... 38 4.8 Service Design Can Trigger the Human Side of Food Services …….………….…….... 40

5.0 Conclusion

…………………………………….………………….....………………………….……….………………….…..…………….... 42

5.1 Enablers and Barriers …………………….……………………………………………..…..………………………………………….... 43 5.1 Additional Research Needed For the Future ….………………..………………………………………….... 44

6.0 Bibliography

………………………………………….……….....………………………………….……………………...…………….... 45

7.0 Appendices ………………………………………….……….....………..…………………………….……………………..….…………....

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7.1 Appendix A ……………….………………….....…………………………..……………………………….…………………………………….... 49 7.2 Appendix B ……………….………………….....…………………………..……………………………….………………….…..…………….... 51 7.3 Appendix C …………..….………………….....…………………………..……………………………….……………………..……….…….... 54 7.4 Appendix D ……………….………………….....….……………………..……………………………….……………………..……….…….... 55 7.5 Appendix E ……………….……………..….....…………………………..……………………………….……………………..……………...... 61 7.6 Appendix F ……………….……………..….....…………………………..……………………………….……………………..…………..….... 63 7.7 Appendix G ……………….…..…………….....…………………………..……………………………….……………………..………….….... 64 7.8 Appendix H ……………….…….………….....…………………………..……………………………….……………………..…….……….... 65 7.9 Appendix I ……………….…..…………….....…………………………..……………………………….………………………..…………….... 66 7.10 Appendix J ……………………………….....…………………………..……………………………….……………………....…………….... 67 7.11 Appendix K ……………….……………….....…………………………..………………………………..……………………..…………….... 68 7.12 Appendix L ……………….…….……….....…………………………..…………………..…………….……………………..…………….... 70 7.13 Appendix M ………………..…………….....…………………………..……………………………….……………………..…….……….... 71

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LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES

Figure 1. Millennial Insights (qualitative data from questionnaires) ………….….. 23 Figure 2. Quantitative data from the questionnaires ………………….…………….. 24 Figure 3. Affinity Map ……………………………………………………………....…….. 24 Table 1. Some Good Practices for Different Types of Food Service Experiences 12

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INTRODUCTION

The Problem Food is a powerful tool in social interactions and has a big part in social cultures. It is an element that brings people together and makes people gather around, not only when being consumed but also throughout its preparation.

The characteristics of the millennial generation and their food consumption behaviours, intersect in an interesting way. Currently, we are observing substantial shifts in consumption habits, witnessing a transformation from the era of ownership into the era of usership. The millennial generation in particular, values the investment in the experiences rather than in the materialistic goods. The meaning is what matters to them, rather than the possessions and this continues to be created through personal and social interactions amongst people. With respect to food, the new generation is looking more for experiences that go beyond the food itself and this trend is changing the cultural norms and is consequently affecting the way we socially interact with each other. Food enables them to come together, share the moment, and experience the co-created value, forming real life social platforms.

Service designers, on the other hand, are one of the influencers triggering and creating those platforms. Therefore, service designers with their user-centric, cocreative and holistic approach will be playing a significant role in the planning, development and delivery of food services to fulfil the diversified customer expectations.

Therefore, I will be exploring the Research Question: In what ways are the patterns and attitudes of the millennial generation around food consumption being translated into new service propositions and how can a service design approach facilitate this shift?

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Aims & Objectives This research will cover how eating experiences are shaped by the millennial generation and how can service design be used as a tool for this. I will be investigating how the patterns and attitudes of the millennial generation around food consumption are being translated into new and novel food services in the UK and the potential role of a service design approach in this area.

Throughout this paper, I will be describing my research, looking at food consumption trends in terms of eating experiences, how these are all being shaped by the millennial generation and the most important of all, how service design can play a role in this equation.

LITERATURE REVIEW

Millennial Generation The millennial generation is described in a wide age range in different sources.

According to Inkling UK Millennials Report, they are defined to be between the ages of 15 and 35. Today, the millennial generation represents one third of the world population and a quarter of the total UK population (inkling, website, 2016).

They want things different and special for them and they like having a story behind every experience (Prepared Foods, website, 2015). “By 2030, Millennials will likely outnumber Baby Boomers 78 million to 56 million� (Turow, e-book, 2015). They are too many and too young to be omitted. But who are they really? Is it only about the age group that we are talking about? How come an age group with such range, can have so much significance and dominance so that everyone talks about them?

These were some of the questions that I had in mind when I started off. Although the validity of the information provided can be discussed, there are some common understandings of what millennials are like, how they see life, what they expect from their lives and consequently how they design their lives.

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Although the full range of millennial characteristics are more extensive, in this section, I will be discussing millennial characteristics, needs and expectations, by focussing on three different themes: Healthier Lifestyles, Experiences over Ownership and The Foodies.

HEALTHIER LIFESTYLES As the human lifespan extended over the years, the value we put into the quality of the life has increased. Well-being and a healthier life is a lot more important today.

Therefore, how we treat our bodies, inevitably becomes something to re-think about. This is related to a range of different things we do in our daily lives, such as what we put into our bodies, how much we exercise, how much we sleep, simply how we live. Consequently, there is an increased awareness of well-being coupled with a better self-treatment. For 77% of the UK millennials, the key to living a more satisfactory and happier life is to have a good physical and mental health and interestingly enough, when asked to compare, 54% says that having a healthier mental health is far more important than having a better physical health (inkling, website, 2016).

What we eat not only affects our physical well-being but also affects our mental wellness. The millennials also favour physical activities such as meditation and yoga, incorporating these rather elite activities into their daily routines in order to improve mental wellbeing. This trend has been reflected into the different aspects of our societal existence, from TV shows on healthy cooking to forms of food available in retail stores; from increased emphasis on cycling to nutrition consciousness.

Hence, food preferences and life styles are changing. The observation that millennials go for ‘nutritious, ethical, sustainable and has good taste combinations’ is validated in the recent food consumption trend studies (Agriculture and AgriFood Canada, website, 2015).

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EXPERIENCES OVER OWNERSHIP Millennials are into experiences and they do not value owning anymore. The fact that this generation is losing interest in the materialistic world is causing a major transformation in the modern societies. So, they do not live or spend the way they used to. There is a search for creative ways and choices for spending (Turow, ebook, 2015).

What we call “servicization” is about businesses taking over the ‘ownerships’ of the materials and goods and turning them into the real needs we are looking for (Tonkinwise, online article, 2014). Not owning but sharing materials and goods creates a great opportunity for people to start looking at things differently and build relationships and connections based on trust. As the millennial generation is losing interest in the materialistic world, it is transforming the modern societies into an experience-oriented one. They value relationships, connections and the way they live. “For this generation, customer service is an expectation, not an exception” (Moore, 2007, p.5).

This shift into the ‘experience economy’ naturally influences their buying behaviours in various sectors as well. “The over-valuing of experiences over possessions for UK Millennials is so significant that they are thought to be the primary driver of the ‘experience economy’ with estimates that they spend a whopping £ 419.5 million monthly on live events” (inkling, website, 2016). Only one quarter of the millennials in the UK are worried about buying a house someday. On the other hand, according to a research that Eventbrite conducted, more than half of the UK millennials prefer to invest and spend on experiences rather than buying (inkling, website, 2016). They are not worried about possessions or ownership anymore.

It has become far more about the present than it was ever before. Now it is about today and how we live today, the quality of the life we live today. However the motivation behind this ‘over-valuing experiences’ is quite interesting. The research also showed that 73% of the millennials are suffering from a condition called: “Fear of Missing Out - FOMO” and this is the reason behind for their constant search of -7-

more new experiences (inkling, website, 2016). Especially in metropolitan cities like London, this situation is interesting yet not very unexpected. There are lots of different cultures and events going on and it is impossible to be everywhere at the same time and experience more.

Coming back to ‘it is much more about the present quality’, the millennial generation want to live longer and healthier in order to have the chance to experience life more and in a much better quality.

In other words, ‘the millennials want to pursue healthy lives with meaningful interactions combinations’ (Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, website, 2015).

Their needs, motivations and their views are shaping today as well as our future and as designers, we need to start taking these motivations more seriously.

THE FOODIES Food has always been an important factor in our lives and in every generation.

However, millennials have taken it to another level with their attitudes as food enthusiasts. Over the time, millennials have become more and more interested in food in different levels such as cooking or eating out or tasting different things and their preferences started to form their ways of self-expression, becoming a part of their identity display, especially in social media. “Today, food is the single fastest growing category on Pinterest” (Turow, e-book, 2015). The motivation behind this growing interest might possibly be about the over-exposure of food in different media channels.

Turow also underlines that, in an earlier study, the 2008 Mintel report, it was stated that early millennials (aged between 18-24) had rising interests in cooking and their desires in staying at home all together for a home-cooked meal were rising (Turow, e-book, 2015). Especially the early millennials and maybe even partially Gen-X, were caught up to the trend of cooking programs, food tastings or competitions, and they started being interested and experimenting (Turow, e-book, 2015).

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“One study notes that 65 percent of the millennial population is “Casual Cooking Enthusiasts,” compared to 53 percent of the general population. Cooking has become a “pleasurable hobby,” with cooks devoting themselves to creating “elaborate” or “gourmet” meals nearly 10 times a year” (Turow, e-book, 2015).

As much as this “hobby” is continuing on rising, this food fanaticism is not only observed in cooking but also in eating out or spending habits: 42% of the millennials eat at least once a month at a fine dining restaurant while baby boomers only do once in two months. They are also 14 times more likely to spend money for food by comparison to an average middle class family and 87% think that money spent on food is acceptable even under financial restrictions. According to a survey conducted by Waitrose, 39% of people consider eating out as less of a treat than they used to (Waitrose, website, 2016).

However, millennials are slowly moving away from franchise restaurants simply because they represent the opposite of being mindful about what you are putting into your body and staying healthy. Waitrose survey reports that 71% state that eating healthily and looking after themselves is part of who they are. Through this search for healthy, authentic and unique, millennials have become one of the main drivers and have turned into true supporters of a global “food fanaticism”.

In short, this crazy love for food amongst millennials is substantially growing and getting more and more interesting and creative every day. However, what is it about food that has become this appealing and how did we decide to change the way we position food in our lives? These are some of the questions that are considered and discussed throughout this research paper, in the following sections.

Food in Context In this section, I will be covering how food evolved throughout the time and how it is being perceived today from a design perspective.

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WHAT IS FOOD AND WHERE IT COMES FROM Food has always been something crucial for human life throughout the history as it is something necessary for us to survive. But again, with time, it evolved into something much more than what it was before. Of course the number of people who live on earth also has a lot to do with how they transformed the meaning of it over time. “According to the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, the global population is expected to reach 9.7 billion by the year 2050” (Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, website, 2015). This is creating a higher demand for food and for alternative food providers, leading to different perspectives towards food and adding different dimensions into the whole concept and context of food and making it more complex (Rozin, 2005, p.108).

Restaurants have always been utilised as a platform to relax, socially interact and to create a cultural blend with introductions to different tastes. These platforms have first appeared with the French Revolution when many talented cooks ended up unemployed due to the execution of the aristocratic community. This situation has resulted in the creation of places where good food is served to the bourgeoisie community in an affordable and enjoyable style. The aim was to allow people to have a space to “...restore or rest one’s body from hunger or fatigue, which is why such establishments came to be known as restaurants” (Gustafsson et al., 2006, p.84). However, this transformation was not only limited to the French society.

Similar establishments under the name of “taverns” were found in England as early as 1780s, serving meals for travelling upper classes. For instance “...in 1786, the London Tavern opened. This was a public house used mainly by members of parliament who lived in London during parliamentary sessions, away from their country homes. Politicians, writers and traders needed places for meals, meetings and discussion. From these early days, as well as today, restaurants have been a meeting place in people’s social life” (Gustafsson et al., 2006, p.84). Thus, throughout centuries, food has become a social vehicle for social contacts and interactions.

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FOOD IS NOT JUST FOOD ANYMORE Nowadays people are looking more for experiences that go beyond the food itself, using the restaurants as spaces where they can also socialize. Consequenty the restaurant industry is growing at a fast pace. The people choose to eat out more frequently due to different socio-economic reasons: they have more money to spend, and also family situations have changed (Gustafsson et al., 2006, p.84).

In addition to their search for unique experiences, millennials also have a raised awareness on how food is created demanding their food to be healthy, responsible and inspiring (Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, website, 2015).

There are some current good practices supporting these trends. The five examples given in Table 1 all cover different types of food service experiences, providing an opportunity to see some different design applications in the food sector.

As can be seen from these examples, the current diversification of needs has created a requirement for a new and more broad-based approach in the planning, development and delivery of services to enhance customers’ satisfaction (Gustafsson et al., 2006, p.84).

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Table 1: Some Good Practices for Different Types of Food Service Experiences Name

Everytable (Garfield, website, 2016)

Open Home Restaurants (Harris, online article, 2016)

Restaurant Day (www.restaurantday.org)

Food Waste Supermarket (Sheffield, online article, 2016)

People’s Supermarket (The People's Supermarket, 2017)

Description Everytable offers affordable, fresh, homemade and healthy ready to eat meals to its customers and provides an access to proper food to the community while shifting the perception of good food.

Open home restaurants are basically like Airbnb but with food. You get the opportunity to share a nice dinner time at a local home with some local people. They advertise the menu for the day and their place and you book it if you like. All you need to do is to bring a bottle of wine in exchange.

Restaurant day is about sharing new food experiences together as a community in local areas and creating a carnival day out of it. It is run and organised by volunteers.

UK’s first food waste supermarket near Leeds, is all about helping families who struggle with their livings. Food waste that are still in good shape is organised to be brought together and sold with a “pay as you feel” policy.

People’s supermarket is a supermarket run by local people in voluntary basis in exchange to discounts for grocery shopping. They ultimately aim to bring different communities together by creating several different platforms for social interaction.

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Opportunity Area Introducing healthy and fast food habits into the community and allows people to shift their food consumption habits.

Brings food into the centre of socialising and using it as a major social interaction element.

Allows people to share the time and conversations as well as the domestic foods.

Creates an opportunity for people to bring out their cooking talents and share it with their local communities as well as creating a social platform to bring people together.

Contributes into the circular economy and makes, ‘relocates’ what is considered as waste for a good use.

It both contributes into the circular economy as well as creating opportunities for people to meet and be more engaged with each other.

FOOD AND EATING DESIGN Food, by its nature, has an interesting quality in design. It appeals to all of our senses together and it is probably the only thing that we experience with all of our senses. A food service experience also has the same quality. It is easy to think only about the food itself when we talk about food and design. However, eating is an experience that includes everything that is happening around it and like every other experience all of the different aspects need to be considered as much as possible and the big picture should always be kept in mind (Zampollo, conference paper, 2015, p. 8).

Acknowledging the common inclination towards food experiences, an interesting model called: Five Aspect Meal Model (FAMM) has been proposed by Gustafsson et al. (2006). This model allows the designer to make sure that he/she has to consider and integrate different dimensions into a meal experience when developing a restaurant service. Taking all of the different moments into consideration, such as before you are served, while you are being served and after the meal, the whole experience is analysed within five different aspects: the room, meeting, products, management control system and entirety- expressing an atmosphere. The “room” is about the consideration of the actual space that the experience takes place at, the “products” refer to everything the user is being served such as the food itself, or the beverages. The “management control system” is the operation of what is happening in the backstage and how people and resources are regulated, and finally “entirety” stands for making sure everything is working in a holistic way so that the whole process runs consistant, smoothlyand in harmony (Gustafsson et al., 2006, p.84).

In another example, Zampollo and Peacock (2016) propose a new tool TED (Themes for Eating Design) based on the Five Aspect Meal Model to assist in the idea generation phase of the Food Design process by producing initial themes based on specific eating situations. TED exploits a tool called Visual Explorer (VE) adapting it into “… a method for generating ideas relevant to eating situations to generate the necessary framing questions" (Zampollo and Peacock, 2016, p.5).

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These models aim to present a framework to designers or service providers, in order to create holistic food service experiences that would make the users leave with a happy memory. Zampollo describes that according to Sonja Stummerer and Martin Hablesreiter, “the notion of ‘food design’ refers to the development and sharing of food including all the processes and decisions related to successfully designing of food in a reproducible and recurring way” (Zampollo, conference paper, 2015, p.2).

On the other hand, the concept of eating design refers to the situation of eating.

This covers not only the situations where people eat at restaurants but also all different sorts of situations where people are interacting with food, such as foodto-go, at a picnic, or even at a cinema while eating a popcorn. But of course this includes all kinds of different surrounding aspects like people, atmosphere, service etc. (Zampollo, conference paper, 2015, p.4).

Even though it seems like food design and eating design are seperate from each other according to some views, it needs to be considered as a whole and perceived in an holistic way, just like Sonja Stummerer and Martin Hablesreiter emphasize in their definition of food design. It is an integrated process. Therefore, when talking about food design, the food itself, should not be the only subject.

According to Schmitt, “much of the design literature now agrees that it is not enough to design products or services, but the goal should be designing experiences” (Zampollo, conference paper, 2015, p.6).

All these studies indicate that service design approach could play a significant role in the planning, development and delivery of food services to satisfy the diversified user expectations as well as to increase the competitve advantage of businesses.

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Service Design WHAT IS SERVICE DESIGN? “When you have two coffee shops right next to each other, that each sell the exact same coffee at the exact same price; Service Design is what makes you walk into the one and not the other, come back often and tell your friends about it” (Fonteijn, blog, 2008). This is how Mark Fonteijn puts it in “one line” and summarises the essence of service design.

Service design, offers many options of user experience, using a combination of different tools. It is applied to a wide range of sectors from consumer products to entertainment and from healthcare to banking. Service design is in fact a process creation and a way of thinking that is created by different approaches of different disciplines. However, because the field is still new and evolving; a consensus has not been reached on a single definition. “If you ask ten people what service design is, you would end up with eleven different answers – at least” (Stickdorn and Schneider, 2012, p.29). Therefore, when we look at different views and opinions, we realise different aspects of service design and learn something new about it every time. To make it international enough, I’d like to mention different perspectives from around the world: Mat Hunter, Chief Design Officer at the UK Design Council (2015) defines it as “A service is something that I use but do not own, service design is therefore the shaping of service experiences so that they really work for people. Removing the lumps and bumps that make them frustrating, and then adding some magic to make them compelling” (Design Council, online video, 2015).

With his definition, Hunter actually refers to the user-centric nature of service design and how service design tries to make the world a better place for the user. On the other hand Stefan Moritz (2005), refers to service design as an opportunity to leverage innovation and a tool for cultivating already existing services into a “more useful, usable, desirable and efficient” service both for the user and service providers.

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In his own words: “It is a holistic, multi-disciplinary, integrative field” (Moritz, website, 2005).

According to the Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design, “Service Design as a practice generally results in the design of systems and processes aimed at providing a holistic service to the user” (Stickdorn and Schneider, 2012, p.28). Service design combines different systems, processes and interdisciplinary approaches put together in a creative manner to offer an integrated and unique service to the user. These services may be new or improved ones, to make them more useful, desirable and efficient for all (Stickdorn and Schneider, 2012, p.28).

However, above all of this, service design is really about deeply understanding the user’s perspective by putting them “at the heart of the experience and talking to them” (Fjord, online video, 2017). It is about getting to know them by walking in their shoes and finding their shoes by a strong user research. In order to reach to this level, service designers often look at the whole scope of the experience, including the before, during and after phases. They map out the whole journey and this enables them to see the big picture. Within this big picture, every little detail counts and the magic happens in the moment of determining the happy and pain points of the whole journey and work on those points in order to improve the existing service experiences. This design process allows to ‘uncover some service opportunities’ and initiate service innovation (Fjord, online video, 2017).

After uncovering the user needs and service opportunities, service designers start talking to other stakeholders who are related to the service business. This is as important as talking to the users, because this enables them to see the back-end perspectives, meaning, what happens at the back stage of the experience, what is really feasible and what is not and if not, why. Simply put, understanding the reasons behind the existing situation by considering all of the internal and external people, factors and variables (Fjord, online video, 2017).

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The next step is usually the facilitation of bringing all of these different stakeholders or stakeholder representatives together and encouraging them to ideating on possible solutions, and gathering collective knowledge. This is called co-creation (Fjord, online video, 2017).

As a summary of all this, service design comes together in three key concepts: (Fjord, online video, 2017) 1- User-centricity 2- Co-creation 3- Holistic Approach In the rest of this service design section, I will be discussing these three key concepts and taking you through them step by step.

User-centricity A service designer’s perspective comes in as a good approach for capturing and analysing user points of view. Everyone has their own story. How they work what they do in their free time, what kinds of activities they prefer, where they go for eating and so on. Within these stories, what they have to say about what was really memorable and what was dreadful, makes up the whole nature of the life experiences (Reason et al., 2016, p.54).

On the other hand, from the business perspective, service design makes it possible to create better stories for the users and to eliminate their frustrations while creating a value-led business proposition (Reason et al., 2016, p.54).

Starting with the user, is often the way to go for this approach in order to see and analyse the motivations and goals they are keen to achieve and build the experiences around those (Reason et al., 2016, p.57). “A service design approach, starting from the outside in, often begins by identifying irritations that businesses did not know existed (because they never asked)� (Reason et al., 2016, p.63).

Hearing similar frustrations from several different users, validates the real problems behind and then service design steps in with the necessary tools to analyse and ideate on those frustrations (Reason et al., 2016, p.63).

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This ‘outside-in’ approach allows the service designers to gain lots of different insights on the whole experience by using different kinds of qualitative or quantitative research methods such as in-depth interviews or surveys (Reason et al., 2016, p.58). All in all, it is absolutely necessary to have a real and concrete understanding of the user in the context of social, environmental and cultural aspects, considering the whole ecosystem in a holistic manner and this is what makes service design valuable (Stickdorn and Schneider, 2012, p.36).

Co-creation “Co-creation is a core aspect of the service design philosophy” (Stickdorn and Schneider, 2012, p.198). It is simply the act of collaborative thinking within a group of people that involves different parties (stakeholders) who are concerned with the subject area. It is an activity that needs to be well thought-out, designed and facilitated in order to avoid any possible barriers that may arise such as people who hesitate to speak up or participate. It is the service designer’s job to create a safe and comfortable space to participants in order to attain better and more productive results (Stickdorn and Schneider, 2012, p.198).

A service without the surrounding people who are using the service or interacting with the service is unimaginable. A service lives with the people who use it or with the people who provide it. People are the core of a service and they are the ones who generate the real value within any service (Polaine et al., 2013, p.23).

Therefore, it is actually common sense to bring all the relevant key players together in order to create a collective media or platform which will lead to improving an existing service or ideating for a new service in response to an existing problem or need.

Holistic Approach Keeping a holistic understanding while designing services is essential. It is important to consider the surrounding factors and variables when designing.

Changing conditions (factors and people) are in the nature of services and are inevitable so the acknowledgement of the ecosystem is really essential.

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However, capturing this dynamic system perfectly and expecting the ability to consider every little detail without skipping anything is very unrealistic and actually impossible. With this awareness, one should be mindful about the nature of imperfections but still try to look at the ecosystem as comprehensively as possible in order to take into account as much detail as possible (Stickdorn and Schneider, 2012, p.44).

Service design orchestrates various disciplines and makes it all work together in a harmonious way towards a one aim: to provide all the stakeholders including the user and the service provider a satisfactory experience. This can only be achieved with this well orchestration created through the interdisciplinary and holistic approach of service design (Stickdorn and Schneider, 2012, p.45).

WHY SERVICE DESIGN? What we own is not only about the physical and the technological aspects anymore.

As they get easier to replicate, other factors that provide the essences of the customer experiences, create a competitive advantage in the market and this is where service design steps in (Polaine et al., 2013, p.28).

Service design’s user-centric approach and tools for understanding people in a more empathetic way, capturing the real reasons behind certain behaviours and needs, allows service providers to see how their service can be improved (Reason et al., 2016, p.54). “To get an understanding of irritations that stand in the way of delivering an excellent experience or delights that make it memorable, it is essential to start with the customer. Understanding the outcomes that motivate the customer and determining how to help them achieve these goals is key to delivering a great experience� (Reason et al., 2016, p.57). This means looking at the service not only from the business perspective but especially from the user perspective, really empathizing with them and walking in their shoes.

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This is the key reason why service design approach is needed today. Valuing every individual in a unique way, and analysing these needs and preferences resulting in good service implementation and delivery.

In an ideal case, both the user and the service provider satisfaction should be equally good; while users cannot stop talking about the experience they have been through, the business should be making revenue, spending less and continuing on evolving (Reason et al., 2016, p.56).

Ben Reason argues that service providers can sometimes become hesitant about asking what their customers think about their services, simply because they lack self-confidence on confronting the real thoughts and they do not really want to get themselves into the trouble of having have to try and improve the service based on the feedback they get. He suggests that, service designers are actually equipped enough to tackle this reluctance with their user understanding approach of starting with the people. Thus, service providers do not need to go through the trouble of getting overwhelmed under all the negative feedbacks they might get nor worry about how to get better because service designers are going to be there to formulate the framework and analyse (Reason, 2013, p.15). “A creative response to customer issues can lead to solutions that are much less “us and them”, and instead of aligning customers and service providers in value creation” (Reason, 2013, p.15).

On the way to sustaining this alignment, service design offers various tools and methods for cheap and quick prototyping applications in order to try and test the future development or service improvements before implementing and thus prevent the huge costs of a implementation result that doesn’t really work (Polaine et al., 2013, p.33). To sum up, service design today, is really a must have in order to stay and grow rapidly, by constantly listening to customers’ feedbacks and building on the real needs, without having the fear of hearing the realities nor the outrageous implementation costs.

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HOW SERVICE DESIGN IS RELEVANT TO THIS RESEARCH? This research studies how millennials today are shaping today’s food consumption habits, by looking at current food service trends, what do we really mean by millennials, and most importantly what do they really want and need? Does what they need and want match with what they have? How can we initiate a better match by utilising service design?

Today we all observe how food service industry is rapidly growing in various channels, but do we really know to what extent they are designed directly for their users? I believe it all comes down to “…basing service propositions on insights. The service proposition is essentially the business proposition, but seen from both the business and the customer/user perspective” (Polaine et al., 2013, p.110).

In order to truly uncover the unmet needs or the market potentials, through a strong user research, a “service proposition needs to be based on real insights” (Polaine et al., 2013, p.110). Therefore a service design approach is necessary in order to really understand the relationships between different relevant stakeholders and their motivations (Polaine et al., 2013, p.187). In short, service design brings an understanding about how not to design for people but with them and that is when it transforms form a business idea into a values-led service design proposition (Reason et al., 2016, p.89).

Based on these views, I will be investigating and discussing if the service design approach is exploited in the new service propositions formed in response to the user demands of the millennial generation.

METHODOLOGY

In order to gain a better understanding about the topic I am looking at, I have decided to apply a service design research methodology and in this section, I will take you through the journey step by step.

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The nature of my topic had three different perspectives: millennials, food and food service sector, and service design. Throughout my design research, I have tried to centre my approach on the user group itself: the millennials. Therefore, I decided to organise my methodology in two categories in terms of stakeholders: 1- Understanding the user group: the millennials 2- Understanding the professionals in the food service sector and service designers As a service designer besides covering the literature, I wanted to make sure I had real insights by talking to people. Therefore, for both categories, I wanted to make sure that I had up-to-date information from different parties who are currently involved in the ecosystem.

Subsequent to a comprehensive secondary research, I reached to a point where I needed to gain a better understanding about millennials and I have prepared an online questionnaire (See Appendix A). With this questionnaire, the aim was to narrow down my definition of a millennial and make it more specific as well as understanding some of their different perspectives on food, eating out and cooking habits and food experiences. The survey was also useful in terms of collecting a substantial amounts of both qualitative and quantitative data in a short period.

In order to analyse the second part “understanding the professionals in the food service sector and service designers� I have selected seven different key roles, namely; service designers, market researchers, hospitality sector, experience designers, food designers, design researchers and food retail industry, in order to determine what kind of professionals I will be looking for.

Within these key roles, I started searching for relevant people to get in touch for indepth interviews. After identifying the people that I wanted to speak with (See Appendix B), I have sent all of them separate emails, explaining my research area and why I thought speaking to them might be relevant and useful (See Appendix C).

I have interviewed six different professionals in total, four in person and two via Skype call, covering different areas of expertise.

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I structured the questions that I wanted to ask them by listing out three objectives for each participant based on their professional backgrounds and prepared individual sets of questions. Although all of the question decks had some common questions, some questions were specific to that certain person (See Appendix D).

Subsequently, I created a one-page list of insights and notes that I found interesting for each interview (See Appendix E).

After gathering all the data both from millennials and professionals, first I wrote down all of the interesting insights and information that I thought might be interesting to mention or to consider (See Fig.1 and 2). I have then started creating clusters by bringing similar and related insights together and have grouped them.

This allowed me to develop an affinity map (See Fig.3) which helped me in organising my findings and discussion.

Fig.1 Millennial Insights (qualitative data from questionnaires)

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Fig.2 Quantitative data from the questionnaires

Fig.3 Affinity Map - 24 -

As for my secondary research, I aimed to collect information around; lifestyles and characteristics of millennials, food, eating design, food consumption and service design by putting the user at the centre and utilising an empathetic approach.

Finally, in order to have a better bigger picture of my outline, I have mapped out the structure / outline of my research in a visual way (See Appendix F). I found this especially useful because it allowed me to see every little detail at the same time and enabled me to keep the consecutive sections in mind and to modify when necessary. It was a good holistic tool to keep me on track.

FINDINGS, DISCUSSION AND ANALYSIS

In this section, I will be mainly presenting and discussing the key findings of my primary research supported or contradicted by the secondary research findings.

As stated in the methodology, as a service designer, with a service design approach, I needed to support my findings by reaching out to real insights and I utilised both interviews and the questionnaire results in order to do this.

The questionnaire was mainly to reach out to as many millennials as possible, collecting both quantitative and qualitative data and to obtain an overall feel about their preferences and perspectives towards food and food services, in order to compare with the literature data.

On the other hand interviews were mainly with professionals who were involved in food, design and service design industries. This enabled me to gain an understanding about the back end of the food and design industries and see if the front and back ends were actually matching or not, in other words if what was provided actually matched the real needs.

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44 people form 23 different countries in total have participated in the questionnaire. 70.5% of this group live in the UK and 61.4% live in London. 56.8% were in the age group of 22-30 (early millennials) and 29.5% were 30-38 (late millennials). Given this data, it can be stated that my research was mainly focused on early millennials who live in London, UK with a multicultural background.

59.1% of this group define themselves as people who “Live to Eat over Eat to Live”.

On the other hand 47.7% claim that they are willing to spend £10-30 for a quality dinner out while 34.1% eat out 2-3 times a week and 43.2% eat out once a week. All of these also indicate that this group is fairly interested in food (Sukan, questionnaire, 2017).

On the other hand, from the interviews a good amount of qualitative data were collected around:  Food services today  Millennial tendencies  Different perceptions of food and interesting opinions on the intersection of food and service design  Different views around service design approach Food is discussed to have three main dimensions; Functional, Cultural (emotional) and Economical. It provides the calories we all need to survive (functional), it connects us together in various ways (cultural) and also food and the food system is a massive source of employment (economic) (Barry, interview, 2017).

Integrating all the qualitative and quantitative data I have collected, I will be discussing the findings within the following seven themes: Food as a Fuel, Food is What Brings Us Together, Food: A Tool for Inspiration, Discovery and Creativity, Food as an Experience, Food as a Potion for Immortality, Understanding the User is the Key, and Service Design Can Trigger the Human Side of Food Services.

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Food as a Fuel Food can simply be what it is sometimes, it doesn’t have to have a meaning or anything, and it can just be something that we actually need to survive at some point. It is exactly like what Martta Oliveira says: “Some people just eat to be full and convenience is what matters for them and other people eat for nourishment of body, soul and mind” (Oliveira, interview, 2017). Food is something we need to continue our lives and use as a ‘fuel’ however, the way we put in the fuel into our body could change a lot. So as Mark Scholfield says, “it is a necessity but it could also be a luxury” (Scholfield, interview, 2017).

Within the responses that I have received from the questionnaires, for the question “What does food mean to you?” there were also some similar quotes supporting the view of food as a fuel (See Appendix G). People claimed that food meant “…a form of energy to get through the day” or “…something I put into my body to survive sometimes” (Sukan, questionnaire, 2017).

On the other hand, it was interesting to see that 43.2% eat out for convenience and 25% eat out due to lack of time (Sukan, questionnaire, 2017). This made me think if it might be the issue of time that drives people to see food as only a source of fuel.

Especially in metropolitan cities like London, time has always been an issue and it still is. This issue of time is consequently affecting the way we choose to behave and act in certain ways. In the interview Oliveira has also expressed that today we are very much involved in our rushed lives, we have a difficult time in focusing on “now” and what we actually need or who we are. We are too much involved in the future and the things that we need to do, we are forgetting to listen to our needs (Oliveira, interview, 2017). Her statement also reinforced my thinking about time.

Taking this into account, the fact that “Food to Go” is growing in the UK is also really significant. Simon Stenning emphasized that there is a rise in “Food to Go” because people have less time and longer working hours (Stenning, interview, 2017). In addition, in today’s societies people value availability more.

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They want to have whatever they want, whenever they want, wherever they want (Stenning, interview, 2017). Immediacy level is urging and this also has a huge impact on the food service industry.

According to a survey conducted by Waitrose, almost 60% of office workers admit to eating at their desks and over 55s are twice more likely to take a lunch break than their younger generation (18-24 aged) colleagues. However only 13% take a full hour for lunch (Waitrose, website, 2016).

Agri-Food Canada, website also emphasizes that customer demands in terms of the immediacy and speed are continuing (Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, website, 2015).

“Food is What Brings Us Together” Food is not only a source for staying alive but also a source for keeping people happy and motivated. “Food is a vessel for love” (Sukan, questionnaire, 2017). It soothes people and make them feel comfortable. “Food is the simplest pleasure” (Sukan, questionnaire, 2017).

Many different people, who participated in the questionnaire, confirm that food actually makes them happy (See Appendix H). However is it really just the food that makes us happy? Food comes with occasions and gatherings. It becomes an excuse for gathering around and sharing moments, “food is what brings us together” (Maslin, interview, 2017). Plenty of the questionnaire participants, agree that lots of things about food is social. Eating is social, cooking is social, and gatherings that involve food are social. When it was asked what food meant to them, the last time they cooked or when they were asked to describe the perfect dining experience they could remember, and many responses involved their loved ones; their partners, families or good friends (Sukan, questionnaire, 2017).

(See Appendix I).

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Here are some of the inspiring insights (Sukan, questionnaire, 2017): “I don’t really remember what we ate but we had a great time.”

“Good company makes it memorable – it doesn’t matter where I go.”

“I expect quality time spent from a good dine out.”

“Food means togetherness.”

“Food creates a great chance to spend quality time with friends and family.”

“A dream food experience: taking my family to shard and creating a memory.”

All of these insights are confirmed by the fact that 63.6% of the same group actually eat out for socialising (Sukan, questionnaire, 2017).

Food is also an incredible opportunity to connect and bond. It is almost a tool for building relationships. It is something that we all do, it is a common ground. It gives people an opportunity to talk to each other and it breaks down barriers (Scholfield, interview, 2017).

Martta Oliveira stated that people need the facilitative quality that food provides rather than the social interactions around food (Oliveira, interview, 2017). Food actually is a media or a platform that everyone can relate to, because everyone has memories related to food and everyone can find something to talk about when it comes to food. We are all social beings and food is just the easiest way to connect.

We can talk about our likes and dislikes, the places that they have been to and many more (Fossa, interview, 2017). The refugee camps and some organisations that facilitate them also acknowledge this fact. Refugees are often brought together with the local people around food, in order to initiate their learnings about the culture that they have come into, as well as to enable them to start and build new relationships. People use supper clubs and social dinners to meet with each other to form new acquaintances and relationships. People, by nature, want to belong while expressing their identities and food is just a very elegantly simple way to initiate expressions of identities and create a bond with the culture that you are living in (Fossa, interview, 2017).

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On the other hand with the rising media exposure of the food, people talk a lot more about food then they did before (Stenning, interview, 2017). It is amazing to see how we can easily find online what people had for lunch in a visual way or learn about a crazy new way to cook the same old chicken while we are zapping. In contrast to this, according to Mark Scholfield, millennials actually have lost their time with technology and now they are slowly starting to realise this and they are trying to gain the lost time back. They are trying to spend more quality time with their loved ones and reduce the technological interactions (Scholfield, interview, 2017). Simon Stenning confirms this and states that gathering together around a table with everyone on their phones, is actually changing now and will continue to change. Nowadays, people are a lot more mindful of the valuable time spent with each other and they are changing behaviours (Stenning, interview, 2017).

All these findings indicate that food plays a pivotal role in many different dimensions of our societal interactions.

These findings are in agreement with Turow (Turow, e-book, 2015) who discusses that “shutting off your phone, ordering a good bottle of Champagne and finding love and compassion the old-fashioned way� is becoming trendy amongst millennials. She argues that eating together is the easiest way to break isolating habits and best conversations begin at the kitchen and or dining room.

Similarly, Gustafsson et al., reiterates that restaurants and taverns have been a means for meals, meetings and discussions for politicians, writers and traders even in the early days and nowadays people are looking more for experiences that go beyond the food itself, using the restaurants as spaces where they can also socialize (Gustafsson et al, 2006, p.84).

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Food: A Tool for Inspiration, Discovery and Creativity We enjoy the company provided by the different platforms of food, but that is not enough. We want variety and we want to try. We would like to have options and see them and maybe also share them with each other. Millennials travel a lot more than baby boomers did when they were younger and consequently they see more, they try more, they learn that there is a lot more to experience (Stenning, interview, 2017). As they travel more, they get the chance to try authentic food from different cultures and they want to incorporate them into their routines. The rise of more and more authentic food and craft is a consequence of this (Stenning, interview, 2017). Stenning also states that there is also a rise of demand in the street food culture. Street food has become something acceptable and it was not before. It can be said that this also has a correlation with the desire of trying different things and is a natural consequence of travelling, although it was interesting to notice that only 11.4% of those participated in the questionnaire stated that they liked street food format the most (Sukan, questionnaire, 2017). However there were lots of qualitative data that added up to a common interest in having different options and variety when it comes to food (See Appendix J).

Additionally, when asked the question of what kind of a food service business would she design, if she wanted to create a perfect fit especially for millennials, it was interesting to hear from Veronica Fossa that she would want to start a touring pop-up food service for travellers (Fossa, interview, 2017).

All of this has led me to ask myself, but why do we like having options and variety?

What do we like about having different options of dishes? Isn’t it kind of frustrating in terms of decision making or the possibility of disliking something we may try? As it turns out, having options is not so much of a pain and in fact it makes it even more fun. It brings out the creative side of us.

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It was found from the questionnaires that people saw a value of creativity in food and cooking. It is seen that lots of insights were gathered around the creative and experiential side of food (See Appendix K). People like experimenting with different tastes as well as trying them and this might actually be the reason behind the desire for different options. People stated that they liked trying different things, discovering new tastes and this made them happy. They also mentioned that most of the time this was the reason they enjoyed cooking. They enjoy being creative and experimenting in the kitchen. Cooking is actually “a creative outlet to experiment” (Maslin, interview, 2017). Stenning states that Jamie Oliver might, actually have triggered this hunger for creativity in making and trying new things, by making food a lot more accessible and simpler to engage with than before. In his own words, “…he switched on people’s attention” (Stenning, interview, 2017).

This situation is not only valid for cooking but also for eating out. People are in search for better quality and much more interesting food types. For instance for the lunch time, a triangle sandwich and some crisps were perfectly fine before.

However it is not enough anymore at all. People are looking for different things.

People are changing and they want change. On the other hand, time is still a concern. People do want different things but they want them fast and at a good quality and good value (Stenning, interview, 2017).

Everything is becoming a lot simpler and leaner than it used to be. For instance, fine dining has become a lot more informal today. As a culture, the UK is becoming more relaxed and the nation is changing its reserved attitude especially in London and this attitude is spreading throughout the whole UK, creating a ripple effect (Stenning, interview, 2017). As this trend spreads, people in the UK are slowly becoming more open to new tastes and experiences, allowing an opportunity for being yourself and revealing authenticity. There are more opportunities now, for self-expression in the UK and this is continuing to grow partially through food and food services, allowing the nation build more real relationships and connect at deeper levels.

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According to a survey conducted by Waitrose, 39% of people consider eating out as less of a treat than they used to and of those who prefer to eat in 61% do so, because at home they can be themselves (Waitrose, website, 2016).

“Being yourself” is also emphasized by Turow. He states that there are new restaurants, which are casual but upscale and that these are becoming popular in the US. The customers arrive in jeans and t-shirts but the menu is first class and the comforts of home are offered with a first-class chef (Turow, e-book, 2015).

Waitrose defines Food as a tool for self-expression. Their survey has revealed that 39% of the participants take greater care over how they present food on their plate than they did five years ago. Almost 44% make more of an effort when preparing food if we think a photo will be posted on social media and 9% have shared a picture within the past week (Waitrose, website, 2016).

Food as an Experience “People eat and taste with their eyes” (Scholfield, interview, 2017). All the process of discovery and creativity is actually defined by one simple word: experience.

Every variable within the food service environment; the food itself, the interior design, the smell, the way food is prepared, the music…everything, creates the whole experience and millennials are experience seekers. Barry is a firm believer that there is something about experiential about food. “The millennials want to see food being prepared. They want the sense of theatre. They want the sense of participation. They don’t just want to walk into a functional shop and pick something off a shelf and pay for it and walk out” (Barry, interview, 2017). People also want to feel connected with the ingredients, farmers, producers, rather than just a machine a lab or a factory. So, authenticity is crucial at the experiential level as well. Therefore Barry suggests that a modern shop where it feels like an old fashion market where customers can browse and really feel and touch food and select the ones might be an interesting and attractive service proposition for millennials (Barry, interview, 2017).

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According to my questionnaire results, 56.8% eats out to discover new places, 40.9% to discover new tastes and 45% are willing to spend more than £30 for a quality dinner out, but they expect: good food, a nice memory, excellent service, friendly and knowledgeable staff and a pleasant environment. One claims that a quality dine out needs to be a “delicious, novel experience” (Sukan, questionnaire, 2017). Food service market will stay in growth delivering experiences, especially the millennials studying longer now, have more opportunities to explore what they really want (Stenning, interview, 2017).

Even though technology is nowadays working as an enabler in the food service industry, food still has a tangible aspect and this physical side of it cannot be omitted (Fossa, interview, 2017). This physical side is actually, what contains the whole experience, because when we experience something, we experience it with all of our senses. Marks & Spencer is one of the retailers that acknowledges that the emotional side of food and the emotional side of retailing connectivity is very important and is becoming more important (Barry, interview, 2017). Barry states that human interaction is incredibly important when it comes to food. Marks & Spencer has got a network for a thousand shops in the UK and nearly 500 shops overseas, despite the increasing practices of on-line shopping introduced by companies such as Amazon. Although for many retailers, having shops today is a burden, they believe that “…a retail shop is a place of a community where people can connect and come together in a sense of shared community and belonging created and this can be really powerful” (Barry, interview, 2017). Therefore, all of the tangible aspects need to be considered and designed accordingly, including the food itself and its surroundings.

Findings of other researchers support these views. Turow states that for the millennials “…material commodities are out; experience is in “and many are looking for comfort, allocating a larger percentage of their income to food and travel (Turow, e-book, 2015).

Millennials are also seeking new and unique experiences and this is valid in the food service arena.

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Some new concept restaurants “include open kitchens or windows so that visitors can see into the prep areas, merging the worlds of cooks and diners. A conversation can take place, actually or emotionally, between the patron and the provider.”

(Turow, e-book, 2015).

Zampollo confirms this interactive side of food services and argues that food appeals to all of our senses and it is the only thing that we can experience with all of our senses. A food service experience, where people are interacting with food, such as food-to-go, at a picnic, or even at a cinema while eating a popcorn is also a part of this (Zampollo, conference paper, 2015, p.8).

Considering that people even travel for food today, in order to experience different things, it can be understood that the hunger for food experiences are growing and people are in search for more. All in all, this search for more experiences in terms of authentic food of different cultures as well as different types of food services, could be an interesting opportunity area for service design.

Food as a Potion for Immortality In addition to the experiences that millennials are seeking, they care a lot more about themselves and the environment. Health and sustainability are rising issues today. “Single biggest driver for food today is wellbeing” (Barry, interview, 2017).

Millennials are a lot more health conscious about their food and their lifestyles and there is a concern for sustainability (Fossa, interview, 2017).

Stenning underlines that the whole concept of an aging population, especially in the UK, changes lots of things (Stenning, interview, 2017). Barry emphasizes that we have a growing and an aging population facing physical and mental health challenges (Barry, interview, 2017). These challenges influence the way we perceive what we are capable of and urge us to change our behaviours and habits, motivating us to take care of ourselves as well as the world that we are living in.

“Health consciousness and realisation of sustainability problems are the biggest drivers for change” (Maslin, interview, 2017).

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We are acting more conscious about how we are nourishing our body and about our choices, and most importantly, we have started seeing food in a more holistic way. We have started to see different implications of our choices and we have become more aware of our habits (Oliveira, interview, 2017). Hence, we have started making changes in relation to ourselves; we have started treating ourselves in a better way. Human well-being has become to be more valuable than it was before, because we have started to give more credit to it.

Current publications also reflect this trend. Agri-Food Canada, website mentions that customers want things to be healthy (Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, website, 2015).

There has been a significant move away from heavy dishes in the last decades and healthy eating has evolved, simpler cooking becoming a much bigger trend (Waitrose, website, 2016). This is quantified by the Waitrose survey where 71% say that eating healthily and looking after themselves is part of who they are and 60% claim the food they eat now is fresher and lighter than it was five years ago.

As Veronica Fossa states, food is more of a “life style choice�. People are a much more interested in it in comparison to five years ago and everything healthy and craft is very popular today (Fossa, interview, 2017). On the other hand, Marks & Spencer as a retailer, is also very particular about the quality of food that they sell, 98% being their own. Therefore, they do a lot of in-house product development and innovation on ingredients and diets that are healthier and do not rely on other brands and Barry thinks that they are definitely seeing commercial benefits of this policy (Barry, interview, 2017).

Similarly, when we look at the millennial views from the questionnaires within this theme (See Appendix L), there is also a pattern seen there in terms of being mindful about what we choose to eat. In fact, it has been stated by some that they prefer to cook in order to be and to stay in control of what they put into their bodies and how they see food as a gate to good health and as a way of nourishment of the body, mind, soul and the environment (Sukan, questionnaire, 2017).

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On the other hand, as much as this could be an assumption, I see an interesting correlation between the popularity of the health concerns and the rise of demand in Asian food, subconsciously relating to longevity in Asian communities. Within the questionnaires, 59.1% stated that they liked Asian food (Sukan, questionnaire, 2017). When it comes to the question of a dream place to go for a food treat, there were plenty qualitative responses that stated their interest in going somewhere in Asia like Japan or China (See Appendix M).

Considering that Asia is known with its healthy life style with a healthy food culture, this could be a reason of the generation’s soft spot for Asian food, trying to stay healthy and adopt healthier cultures for food and life styles. Authentic food from different cultures are easier to find in London now, when compared to five years ago (Maslin, interview, 2017).

Environmental sustainability agenda is parallel to well-being, as clean environments are required for healthy individuals. According to Barry, The whole aspect of transparency and provenance and knowing where food comes from is becoming an important parameter (Barry, interview, 2017).

It is seen that there is a considerable tendency towards healthy and responsible food and a raised awareness on how food is created. This concern and mindfulness drives the consumers into the path of personalisation for food preferences (Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, website, 2015).

This is also stated as a wide-spread tendency in the US as well by Turow who claims that as food production becomes more traceable, where the food comes from and how it’s produced and distributed will all be decision parameters in the purchasing behaviour of consumers (Turow, e-book, 2015).

According to a survey conducted by Waitrose, 30% of the people in the UK care more about the environment and society today than they did five years ago, 46% throw away less food than they did five years ago. While purchasing, 63% most of the time consider how or where their food is sourced (Waitrose, website, 2016).

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Understanding the User Is the Key In all of the themes that we have covered, there is only one common denominator: the user. Whatever the current trend is at that time, the crucial part is to understand the people who are creating those trends and understanding the motivation behind those trends. This is where service design steps in. The usercentric mind-set that service design has to offer would allow service propositions to become and stay competitive in the market (Oliveira, interview, 2017). Marks & Spencer also listens to their customers all the time and finds a lot more important today than it was before, due to a more competitive market place (Barry, interview, 2017). Barry emphasizes that “… because things are so competitive and customers have so many choices now on how they spend their money so if you are not absolutely listening to your customers, than you will lose” (Barry, interview, 2017).

Oliveira argues that there is in fact “a huge buzz about millennials” and how this over generalisation is actually irrelevant because in fact what matters is relative depending on the context that we are talking about, including the culture, background, situational conditions and individual needs. She says that one should focus more on the why much more than who (Oliveira, interview, 2017).

Keeping this in mind, we also need to be aware of other parameters within the systems. Barry reinforces that for many trends, there is a background signal, indicating a change behind the scenes, amongst different stakeholders such as, scientists, technologists, food producers, chefs, politicians, medical doctors, etc. It may not be obvious at first, it starts tiny and then it grows (Barry, interview, 2017).

For example, there is a growing pressure from the governments around the world for directing populations towards healthier dietary habits particularly because governments are at difficulty paying for the medical expenses of the aging populations. They are trying to prevent diet-related ailments as much as possible by increased awareness for healthier life-styles. Therefore, governments are challenging businesses through either taxes or bans, and encouraging increasing public information through food labelling (Barry, interview, 2017).

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Furthermore, although the UK food market is a mature one, as country has become a little bit richer, and more middle class, the dietary habits have changed (Barry, interview, 2017). For example, where is more meat-based diet around the world, in the UK there is a slight trend to eat less meat, partially driven by health concerns and partly by animal welfare and to a small but in growing extent, environmental concerns. “So we are definitely seeing a small but growing trend to reduce the amount of meat that people eat – in some cases that’s turning to vegetarianism and veganism but for many it’s just about eating less meat” (Barry, interview, 2017).

There is also a trend towards eating less sugar. In the next 5 to 10 years, it is expected to witness personalisation of health, involving suggestions for personalised diets based on individual DNA analyses (Barry, interview, 2017).

Thus, political and economic changes cause major shifts in consumer preferences and societal trends (Stenning, interview, 2017). Even though the term millennials is defined as a segment, and this helps designers to have a feel of where the world is going, it shouldn’t be something to be relied on completely. Like Marks says, “Being and staying relevant, is more important than being trendy” (Scholfield, interview, 2017).

Turow reports the views of Darren Tristano, the executive vice president of a food industry-consulting firm, Technomic, saying, “Success with today’s millennial consumer will depend on making an emotional connection.” (Turow, e-book, 2015).

For all purpose and user groups, eating is a holistic experience and all of the different aspects need to be taken into consideration when delivering food services (Zampollo, conference paper, 2015, p. 8).

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Service Design Can Trigger The Human Side of Food Services There is no such thing as a perfect service experience. It is all relative and we are all unique. However, there are some certain fundamentals for a commonly desirable service in general. Martta Oliveira suggests that a good service is mainly about consistency and harmony and it should be designed by talking to people and exploring their needs (Oliveira, interview, 2017). On the other hand Mark Scholfield says that it is about getting to know your customers, being consistent and creating a smooth enjoyable process (Scholfield, interview, 2017).

Veronica Fossa underlines that there must be an intention behind an eating design and it must be considered who it is for (Fossa, interview, 2017). I agree with all of them, a service needs to progress smoothly and consistently in every detail but it also needs to sustain the relationships with the users. Therefore, again when necessary a good service needs to be able to adapt in changing conditions and not only at the front end of the service but also within various different layers. A successful service design is a one that keeps up with the dynamic human nature.

This view is confirmed to some extent both by Simon Stenning and Veronica Fossa. Fossa proposes that there is actually the human aspect missing in the food service industry and service providers hardly ever put themselves into the shoes of their customers (Fossa, interview, 2017). On the other hand Stenning argues that “There is a lack of empathy in food services and there is not enough thought goes into it” (Stenning, interview, 2017). He says that because it is quite a traditional industry, they are not bothered to challenge it or to empathise in order to improve the whole experience for the user itself. However, at the end of the day, it is all about the people who are being served and the success is up to making the user happy, leaving them with a great memory at the back of their head or maybe in their Instagram account. As Scofield puts it, “it has to be all about the guest” (Scholfield, interview, 2017).

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It is an advantage that London as a city, has the potential and composure in meeting the user needs and individuals are far more valued within the city culture (Oliveira, interview, 2017). It is the user who creates the value and makes it unique.

Therefore, in order to sustain a certain value, users need to be involved in the collision of any value.

What a value is, can be perceived in several different ways. To some, it is the best possible experience that we could get for the least amount of money (Scholfield, interview, 2017). To others, it is not about the money at all. It is all about the fulfilment of needs depending on the context at that certain time (Oliveira, interview, 2017).

I agree that it actually depends on what you really need at that moment and if that need was fulfilled or not. If your need is always to stay in budget then it is about the money. However, money might not be an issue in certain times. For instance if the subject was your life and health, and if you have the conditions for your treatment, money wouldn’t be a priority and your main concern would be to be healthy again.

Therefore, a service designer always needs to have a benefit of doubt, to capture the findings, to consider all as an assumption and then to go validate this with the actual users with an extensive user research that involves talking to them. Of course, when it is necessary the suggested service proposition should be flexible to adaption and improvement.

As Polaine puts the unmet needs or the market potentials can only be truly covered through a strong user research revealing the relationships between different relevant stakeholders and their motivations, therefore a service design approach is necessary in order to really understand the relationships between different relevant stakeholders and their motivations (Polaine et al., 2013, p.187).

The satisfaction of both the user and the service provider should be equally valued; the users should be appreciating the unique experience while the businesses are making revenue with minimal investment and operational costs with an intelligent determination to continually improve and evolve (Reason et al., 2016, p.56).

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CONCLUSION

The customer demands of the millennial generation are unique, making them one of the main drivers of a societal transformation we are witnessing. Consumer preferences and habits are substantially shifting towards investments in experiences rather than possessions. Food is a powerful tool in social interactions, triggering social interactions not only while being consumed but also throughout its preparation phases. The millennial generation is looking at food and food services as a platform for bringing people together, a tool for inspiration, discovery and creativity, as a gateway to health and well-being as well as a means of collecting new experiences, in addition to its being a nutrition for survival. This diversification of needs requires a novel approach incorporating an in depth understanding of the user to enhance customer satisfaction.

This study has attempted to provide an insight to the values of the millennial generation, as users from the perspective of food experiences. It exhibits how these changing preferences and attitudes are being reflected in the responses of relevant stakeholders namely; service designers, market researchers, professionals in hospitality sector, experience designers, food designers, design researchers and professionals in the food retail industry.

It can be concluded that many of the service providers are actually considering the changing consumer demands, however a systematic implementation of service design approach is still missing, especially in terms of user-centeredness.

Service design is truly an asset for businesses to survive and grow rapidly in today’s competitive ecosystems. Service design approach provides an ideal interface for building on the real needs by continuous user feedbacks and aligned improvements.

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Service designers with their user-centric, co-creative and holistic mind-set could play a significant role in the planning, development and delivery of food services to fulfil the diversified consumer expectations as well as to increase the competitive advantage of businesses.

Enablers and Barriers Undoubtedly, throughout the process of focussing more on the user itself within the food service sector, of course, there will be some barriers as well as some enablers.

Technology itself, could act as a huge enabler to start with. With the currently developing technologies such as big data and artificial intelligence, it is getting a lot easier to access substantial data in order to identify and interpret significant user behaviours. When exploited smartly and responsibly, technology can become a great enabler for gathering better user insights and these insights may be used for further service design developments.

On the other hand, individual drives and motivations for a more sustainable life, well-being and human welfare that are rising today. These individual motivations are slowly adding up to a very powerful societal pressure to live better. These strong motivations will need to be taken into consideration more systematically and extensively by businesses.

Thirdly, socio-economic pressures forcing governments to take action for more sustainable systems can in fact become a reinforcement for change making, both from user and from service provider perspectives.

As for the barriers, the fact that service design is still a growing and relatively new sector, affects the way service providers perceive its value. Consequently, this might result in weak trust in the contribution of the discipline and its efficiency.

Furthermore, food service industry is a traditional sector by nature by mediumsized enterprises. It possesses an inherent resistance to change, to high and risky investments.

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The fact that user-centric innovations are not common and their value is not recognised at a wide-spread manner yet creates un-willingness to invest into an indepth study for identifying user demands.

Finally, socio-economic fluctuations that might occur in the future or the ones that are happening now, like Brexit, will always influence financial decisions and investments makings and will stay as a really difficult factor to ignore.

Additional Research Needed For the Future If the service design approach is to be exploited in the new service propositions formed in response to the user demands of the millennial generation, further research is required to develop custom-made tools for the food service sector.

Furthermore, a more extensive stakeholder engagement is needed in order to gain a better understanding of the bigger picture and to understand the possible reasons behind the current trends and desires. This stakeholder engagement might include policy leaders in the UK, professionals from health sector, and local service designers who are particularly working on food services.

Additionally, in order to have a more in depth understanding about the millennials, a more extensive and wider questionnaire can be held only within the UK, followed by series of tests validating the assessment quality of the prepared questionnaire.

Moreover, some in-depth interviews can be conducted with the millennials who are a good fit for the research profile.

Concerning the evaluation of the current service propositions within the UK, a comprehensive ethnographic and socio-economic research can be carried out and the observed practices can be analysed accordingly.

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REFERENCES Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada –AAFC (2015) Canada Emerging Food Innovation: Trends and Opportunities [Online] Available: http://www.agr.gc.ca/eng/industry-markets-and-trade/market-informationby-sector/processed-food-and-beverages/trends-and-market-opportunitiesfor-the-food-processing-sector/emerging-food-innovation-trends-andopportunities/?id=1449236177345#alt (Accessed 24/07/17).

Barry, Mike (2017) Director of Sustainable Business (Plan A) at Marks and Spencer.

Skype Interview with Seran Sukan. London, UK, 01 September 2017.

Fjord (2017) What is Service Design? A tale of two coffee shops, [Vimeo], 12 April.

Available: https://vimeo.com/212939377 (Accessed 18/08/17).

Fonteijn, Marc (2008) One line of Service Design, 31 Volts Blog, 28/03/2008 [Online] Available: http://www.31volts.com/en/2008/03/one-line-of-service-design/ (Accessed 04/09/2017).

Fossa, Veronica (2017) Food Strategist and Founder at WE Factory. Skype Interview with Seran Sukan. London, UK, 22 August 2017.

Garfield, Leanna (2016) This healthy fast food chain adjusts its prices based on local income levels [Online] Los Angeles: Business Insider UK, Available: http://uk.businessinsider.com/everytable-healthy-fast-food-chain-changesprices-depending-on-neighborhood-2016-7?r=US&IR=T (Accessed 24/06/2017).

Gustafsson, Inga-Britt, Öström, Åsa, Johansson, Jesper and Mossberg, Lena (2006) The Five Aspects Meal Model: A Tool for Developing Meal Services in Restaurants, Journal of Foodservice [Online] 17. Available: https://www.livsmedelsverket.se/globalassets/matvanor-halsa- 45 -

miljo/maltider-vard-skola-omsorg/om-offentligamaltider/maltidsmodellen/famm-vetenskaplig-artikel.pdf (Accessed 12/08/2017).

Harris, Sophia (2016) Restaurants in Private Homes - Sharing Economy's Latest Trend, CBC News Business, 27 April [Online] Available: http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/restaurants-private-home-1.3553764 (Accessed 24/06/2017). http://www.restaurantday.org/en/ (Accessed 24/06/17). inkling (2016) UK Millennials Report [Online] London: inkling. Available: http://www.thisisinkling.com/inklingreports/2016/1/21/inkling-report-no1-uk-millennials (Accessed 15/07/2017).

Maslin, Rob (2017) Director, Service Designer and Design Researcher at We All Design. Interview with Seran Sukan. London, UK, 15 August 2017.

Moore, Alicia (2007) They've Never Taken a Swim and Thought about Jaws: Understanding the Millennial Generation, College and University Journal [Online] 82(4) Available: https://www.pacrao.org/docs/resources/writersteam/UnderstandingTheMill ennialGeneration.doc (Accessed 31/07/2017).

Moritz, Stefan (2005) Service Design: A Practical Access to an Evolving Field [Online] Cologne: University of Applied Sciences Cologne. Available: http://www.stefan-moritz.com/ (Accessed 05/11/2016).

Oliveira, Martta (2017) Senior Service Design Consultant at Engine Service Design.

Interview with Seran Sukan. London, UK, 22 August 2017.

Polaine, Andy, LvĚœlie, Lavrans and Reason, Ben (2013) Service Design: From Insight to Implementation, New York: Rosenfeld Media.

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Prepared Foods (2015) Top 10 Food and Beverage Trends for 2015 [Online] Amsterdam: Prepared Foods. Available: http://www.preparedfoods.com/articles/114835-top-10-food-and-beveragetrends-for-2015 (Accessed 24/07/17).

Reason, Ben (2013) The Service Design Promise, Touchpoint Deep Dive: Collecting Relevant Insights [Online] 5(1). Available: https://www.service-designnetwork.org/touchpoint/touchpoint-vol-5-no-1-deep-dive-collectingrelevant-insights/the-service-design-promise (Accessed 15/07/2017).

Reason, Ben, Løvlie, Lavrans and Flu, Melvin Brand (2016) Service Design for Business, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Rozin, Paul (2005) The Meaning of Food in Our Lives: A Cross-Cultural Perspective on Eating and Well-Being, Journal of Nutrition Education and Behaviour [Online] 37(2). Available: http://www.jneb.org/article/S14994046(06)60209-1/abstract (Accessed 15/07/2017).

Scholfield, Mark (2017) Food and Beverage Executive Manager at The Hurlingham Club. Interview with Seran Sukan. London, UK, 15 August 2017.

Sheffield, Hazel (2016) The UK’s first food waste supermarket opens, The Independent, 20 September, Available: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/homenews/first-food-waste-supermarket-uk-leeds-real-junk-food-projecta7317906.html (Accessed 24/06/2017).

Stenning, Simon (2017) Executive Director at MCA Eating and Drinking Out Market Insight. Interview with Seran Sukan. London, UK, 09 August 2017.

Stickdorn, Mark and Schneider, Jackob (2012) This Is Service Design Thinking: Basics, Tools, Cases, Amsterdam, The Netherlands: BIS Publishers Sukan, Seran (2017) Just Food? [questionnaire], 44 responses, Google Forms.

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Tonkinwise, Cameron (2014) Sharing you can Believe in, Medium Available: https://medium.com/@camerontw/sharing-you-can-believe-in9b68718c4b33 (Accessed 24/06/2017).

Turow, Eve (2015) A Taste of Generation Yum: How The Millennial Generation’s Love For Organic Fare, Celebrity Chefs And Microbrews Will Make Or Break The Future Of Food [Kindle version], accessed 01 August 2017 from Amazon.com UK Design Council (2015) What is service design?, [Vimeo], 1 July. Available: http://www.designcouncil.org.uk/news-opinion/video-what-service-design (Accessed 18/08/17).

Waitrose (2016) The Waitrose Food and Drink Report [Online] UK: Waitrose.

Available: http://www.waitrose.com/home/about_waitrose/the-waitrosefooddrinkreport.html (Accessed 13/07/2017).

Zampollo, Francesca (2015) Food Design for Business, Design For Business: Research Conference, May 12-13 2015, Melbourne, Australia: ideasondesign. Pp.1-18.

Available: https://www.academia.edu/22793953/Food_Design_for_Business (Accessed 10/08/17).

Zampollo, Francesca and Peacock, Matthew (2016) Food Design Thinking: a branch of Design Thinking specific to Food Design, The Journal of Creative Behaviour [Online] 50(3). Available: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/wol1/doi/10.1002/jocb.148/full (Accessed 15/07/2017).

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APPENDICES

Appendix A – Questionnaire Screen Shots and Questions

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Questions: INTRODUCTION 1- Where do you live? (London-UK-Outside of UK) 2- Where are you from? (Open answer) 3- What is your age group? (Multiple selection) 4- Occupation? (Open answer) 5- Which one are you? – I eat to live / I live to eat (Multiple selection) 6- What does food mean to you? (Open answer) 7- Do you like cooking? Why / why not? (Open answer) 8- Tell me about the last time you cooked (were you alone/with friends, were you cooking for yourself or someone else, what were you cooking, where were you...etc.): (Open answer) 9- What types of food do you like? (Multiple selection) 10- To what extent do you see cooking / food as a social activity or an opportunity to spend your time with your friends / family? (Open answer)

HABITS AND EXPECTATIONS 11- How frequently do you eat out? (Multiple selection) 12- Why do you usually eat out? (Multiple selection) 13- How much approximately do you spend (top limit) for a quality dinner out?

(Multiple selection) 14- What do you expect from a really good dine-out experience? (Open answer) DESIRES 15- What kind of eating format do you like the most? (Multiple selection) 16- Could you briefly describe a perfect meal experience that you remember?

Why did you find it perfect? (Open answer) 17- If you could go anywhere in the world to eat, where would that be, how would it look like? What would you be eating? And who would you take with you? (Open answer)

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Appendix B – Interviewee Groups and Short Biographies SERVICE DESIGNER & DESIGN RESEARCHER: Martta Oliveira -Senior Service Design Consultant at Engine Service Design Consultancy Martta has a background in management, and training in design thinking and innovation. She is well travelled, having studied and worked across Europe and Asia. She brings her experience from working in a variety of consulting firms with specialisations ranging from digital strategy to operational excellence. She has experience working across Financial Services, Aviation, Hospitality, Utilities, Education and Logistics. She has helped organisations define their CX strategy, and has guided them through to prototyping and implementation.

Rob Maslin – Director, Service Designer and Design Researcher at We All Design Rob takes a human centred approach to addressing environmental, social and business challenges. His work is driven mainly by understanding people’s behaviour and finding solutions that consider all of the stakeholders from the end user to the people who support the service, but are not seen. He defines himself as an expert on the circular economy and he is passionate about treating social and sustainability issues as mutually inclusive, describing his work as design for good.

FOOD AND EATING DESIGNER: Veronica Fossa – Food Strategist and Founder at WE Factory Veronica Fossa is a translator between design, business and culinary culture based in Vicenza, Italy. Veronica is also a passionate writer, an energetic and compassionate speaker and facilitator, a fan of breakfasts, and the voice of all things WE Factory.

Something of a jack-of-all-trades, she has been working in the creative industries internationally since a decade. She was a part of the New Nordic Food movement and contributed to reviving the Helsinki food scene through Restaurant Day, Open Kitchen and Helsinki Foodism. In 2013 she was awarded the participation to Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs in Copenhagen, whilst drawing up the early plans for what was later to become WE Factory.

Her passions are a melting pot of food culture, design, happiness, well-being, cultures and people, and are reflected in her current pioneering work with WE Factory. In the past years, she has designed food experiences in schools, festivals, and conferences in more than 12 countries. As a speaker and workshop facilitator, Veronica has been invited to share her work about food experience design, play, empathy and happiness

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at organizations and events from Moscow to Chiang Mai, Tallinn to Milan. In 2017, she has co-authored Visual Feast, a book about food styling and photography with Gestalten.

Having lived in 9 cities in 7 countries, Veronica has been defined a ‘brave road-warrior’ who is as at ease in running projects in fast-pacing metropoles to the bucolic countryside and pretty much anywhere in between. Her wide-ranging experiences and travels thus far have granted her a great deal, but the greatest gift has been the people she has met along the way. From farmers to academics, chefs and architects, she noticed that more unites us than separates us, especially when sharing a table. She loves to join the dots, be a catalyst for great ideas and support & inspire change.

She holds an MSc in Economics and Design Management from Jönköping International Business School (Sweden) and a BA in Culture Management from Ca’ Foscari University of Venice (Italy). She is a faculty member at the Master in Food Design at Scuola Politecnica di Design in Milan and has taught and mentored students at various Universities.

MARKET RESEARCHER IN THE FOOD INDUSTRY: Simon Stenning – MCA Eating and drinking out market insight | Executive Director Simon has been delivering cutting edge insight, data and market intelligence to clients across the breadth of the UK food and Beverage sector for the past 7 years with Allegra prior to the Foodservice part of the business being acquired by William Reed Business Media in December 2013. This saw Simon move his team and clients across to continue developing the expert services that clients benefit from. Simon’s career lies completely in Hospitality and Foodservice, with a degree in Hotel and Catering, and a Postgrad diploma in Marketing. An early career included 8 years managing hotels with Hilton and Forte and a period working with Albert Roux, prior to spending 5 years running Pret a Manger in London, helping to grow the business from 10 stores to 80 during the late 1990s. Simon moved into the Contract Catering sector as Retail Marketing Director for Compass Group, before leaving to take an entrepreneurial role launching the Foo-Go range of branded convenience foods. Simon subsequently joined Allegra 8 years ago.

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HOSPITALITY SECTOR: Mark Schofield – Food and Beverage Executive Manager at The Hurlingham Club Mark is a highly motivated and accomplished hospitality professional with twenty years’ experience within the food and beverage, conference and event management and reception services departments of the luxury five star hotel and professional services environments.

FOOD RETAIL: Mike Barry - Director of Sustainable Business (Plan A) at Marks and Spencer Mike is Director of Sustainable Business at the retailer Marks & Spencer.

He was part of the small team that in 2007 developed and delivered the company's ground-breaking Plan A, a 100 point, 5 year plan to address a wide range of environmental and social issues.

Reporting to the CEO, Mike is responsible for delivering M&S’ aspiration to be the world’s most sustainable retailer. His job is to work with the M&S leadership team to integrate sustainability into the heart of the business across its global retail channels and supply chains. In May 2011 Mike was named the Guardian’s inaugural Sustainable Business Innovator of the Year. He is Chair of the World Environment Center, a Visiting Fellow at the Smith Centre for Enterprise and the Environment at Oxford University, a Senior Associate at the Cambridge Programme for Sustainable Leadership and sits on BiTC’s Environment Leadership Team.

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Appendix C – Interviewees Request Email Templates

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Appendix D – Interview Questions INTERVIEW WITH SIMON STENNING Objective 1: To understand the rising trends and opportunities amongst the food service sector in the UK. 1- How would you describe today’s key food consumption trends in the UK?

2- Could you tell me a little bit about the evolution of the trends in the last 5 years? And how do you see this evolving further in the near future?

3- Who do you think are the leading influencers for this evolution?

Objective 2: To discuss the possible reasons behind the behavioural changes of the millennials in the UK towards food consumption.

4- You talk about changing behaviours of millennials in the oxford farming conference and how this is significantly (43%) influencing the food service market, could you please elaborate? (Identified by the industry surveys) 5- What are the biggest drivers of these changing needs and desires? Could you name three?

6- In this age of on-line existence, to what extent do you think the need for MORE social interaction has a role in this?

Objective 3: To explore the reactions of the businesses in the food service sector to the rising needs.

7- You talk about (@OFC) premiumised informality (street food, casual dining, quality food and informal environment) and how UK has now become the nation of foodies and food pleasure seekers, what do you think are the reasons behind this?

8- What do you think about the role of design in the food service market?

9- If you would start a new food service business today, targeting the millennial generation in particular, how would you design it? What would the perfect place be like in your opinion?

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INTERVIEW WITH MARK SCHOLFIELD Objective 1: To explore food as an element in bringing people together.

1-

How do you define food in today’s society?

2- To what extent do you think needs for social interactions aspect has a role in the way people prefer to eat today?

Objective 2: To understand the rising trends and opportunities amongst the food service sector in the UK. 3- How would you describe today’s key food consumption trends in the UK? 4- Could you tell me a little bit about the evolution of the trends in the last 5 years? And how do you see this evolving further in the near future?

5- Who do you think are the leading influencers for this evolution?

6- How do you observe the differences between the demands and desires of millennials and the elderly in terms of food service and consumption, here at Hurlingham club?

Objective 3: To explore opportunity areas in the food service sector today in terms of service design.

7- Do you think the current models used in answering the needs of the millennials’ food consumption habits are working in today’s society?

8- What do you think about the role of design in the food service market?

9- What do you think are the fundamentals of a perfect service?

10- How do you define value in the food service experiences?

11- If you would start a new food service business today, targeting the millennial generation in particular, how would you design it? What would the perfect place be like in your opinion?

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INTERVIEW WITH MARTTA OLIVEIRA Objective 1: To explore food as an element in bringing people together.

1.

How do you define food in today’s society?

2. How would you describe the change in our perceptions towards food and food experiences over the last 5 years? (Or do you see any changes at all?)

3. To what extent do you think needs for social interactions aspect has a role in the way people prefer to eat today?

Objective 2: To explore what to consider when we talk about eating design and how things would differ when it is for millennials in particular.

4. How do you define value in the food service experiences?

5. What kinds of changes do you see in the way millennials prefer to eat today when compared to the way it was 5 years ago?

6. What do you think are the biggest drivers of these changing needs and desires? Could you name three?

Objective 3: To explore opportunity areas in the food service sector today in terms of service design and design thinking.

7. What do you think about the role of service design in the food service market? What do you think are the biggest strengths and weaknesses (or enablers and blockers) of the discipline, within the food service industry?

8. In what ways design thinking contributes to the current food services and how do you think this industry can benefit more from design thinking?

9. Have you ever been involved in a food service design project? How was the process like? Could you tell me a little bit about it?

10. Do you think the current models used in answering the needs of the millennials’ food consumption habits are working in today’s society?

11. If you would start a new food service business today, targeting the millennial generation in particular, how would you design it? What would the perfect

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INTERVIEW WITH MIKE BARRY Objective 1: To explore food as a concept and to understand the rising trends and opportunities amongst the food service sector in the UK. 1- How do you define food in today’s society?

2- How would you describe today’s key food consumption trends in the UK? 3- Could you tell me a little bit about the evolution of the trends in the last 5 years? And how do you see this evolving further in the near future?

Objective 2: To discuss the possible reasons behind the behavioural changes of the millennials in the UK towards food consumption.

4- What are the biggest drivers / leading influencers of these changing needs and desires? Could you name three?

5- In this age of on-line existence, to what extent do you think the need for MORE social interaction has a role in the changes that we are seeing?

6- Why do you think people are shifting towards well-being nowadays?

Objective 3: To explore the responses of the businesses in the food service sector to the rising needs.

7- What does M&S do for adapting to these changing needs?

8- What do you think about the role of service design in the food retail market?

9- If you would start a new food business today, targeting the millennial generation in particular, how would you design it? What would the perfect place be like in your opinion?

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INTERVIEW WITH ROB MASLIN Objective 1: To explore food as an element in bringing people together.

1- How do you define food in today’s society?

2- To what extent do you think needs for social interactions aspect has a role in the way people prefer to eat today?

3- How does eating design study the cultural and social aspects of food as a platform to bring people together?

Objective 2: To explore what to consider when we talk about eating design and how things would differ when it is for millennials in particular.

4- What kinds of changes do you see in the way millennials prefer to eat today when compared to the way it was 5 years ago?

5- What are the biggest drivers of these changing needs and desires? Could you name three?

Objective 3: To explore opportunity areas in the food service sector today in terms of service design.

6- Do you think the current models used in answering the needs of the millennials’ food consumption habits are working in today’s society?

7- If you would start a new food service business today, targeting the millennial generation in particular, how would you design it? What would the perfect place be like in your opinion?

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INTERVIEW WITH VERONICA FOSSA Objective 1: To explore food as an element in bringing people together.

1- How do you define food in today’s society?

2- How would you describe the change in our perceptions towards food and food experiences over the last 5 years? (Or do you see any changes at all?)

3- To what extent do you think needs for social interactions aspect has a role in the way people prefer to eat today?

4- To what extent do you think eating design facilitates food to become a platform for bringing people together?

Objective 2: To explore what to consider when we talk about eating design and how things would differ when it is for millennials in particular.

5- How do you define value in the food service experiences?

6- What kinds of changes do you see in the way millennials prefer to eat today when compared to the way it was 5 years ago?

7- What do you think are the biggest drivers of these changing needs and desires? Could you name three?

Objective 3: To explore opportunity areas in the food service sector today in terms of service design and design thinking.

8- What do you think about the role of service design in the food service market? What do you think are the biggest strengths and weaknesses (or enablers and blockers) of the discipline, within the food service industry?

9- In what ways design thinking contributes to the current food services and how do you think this industry can benefit more from design thinking 10- Do you think the current models used in answering the needs of the millennials’ food consumption habits are working in today’s society?

11- Could you tell me a little bit about one of your favourite food service design projects? How was the process like? What were the challenges?

12- If you would start a new food service business today, targeting the millennial generation in particular, how would you design it? What would the perfect place be like in your opinion?

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Appendix E – Interview Insights

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Appendix F – Research Outline Mappings

First Draft

Second Draft

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Appendix G – Food as a Fuel: Questionnaire Insights

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Appendix H – Food Makes us Happy: Questionnaire Insights

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Appendix I – Brings us Together: Questionnaire Insights

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Appendix J – We Like Having Options and Variety: Questionnaire Insights

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Appendix K – Creative and Experiential Side of Food: Questionnaire Insights

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Appendix L – Being Mindful about What We Choose to Eat: Questionnaire Insights

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Appendix M – Interest in Asian Food: Questionnaire Insights

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