Future winners will solve health, sustainability and commercial challenges at the same time, creating businesses designed for long-term success.
The challenges facing the away from home market are becoming more interconnected. Rising health concerns, growing sustainability expectations, regulatory pressure, ongoing cost pressures and the need to deliver growth and profitability are blurring into one.
Future fit: healthier, greener, resilient is one of the three defining themes shaping the future of the away from home market. The businesses best positioned for long-term success will be those that can balance and deliver against multiple priorities at once, with the foresight to plan for what’s coming next.
Our latest report looking at global innovation in the away from home market demonstrates how operators and caterers are already finding ways to support health, sustainability and commercial goals at the same time.
Personalised nutrition
As health becomes more personalised, operators are exploring ways to tailor food and drink offers to individual needs without adding operational complexity. Healthcare is one sector where this opportunity is particularly relevant, as individual patient needs need to be catered for.
Blendid's robotic smoothie kiosk at Mayo Clinic, Minnesota, shows how automation could help operators respond more quickly and consistently to individual patient needs, making tailored nutrition easier to deliver at scale. In an environment where healthcare providers are under increasing pressure, technology has the potential to improve both efficiency and patient care.
Shaping healthier habits for the next generation
While personalised nutrition focuses on individual outcomes, there is growing recognition that away from home operators have an important role to play in shaping broader dietary habits.
The Bang in Some Beans campaign highlights how relatively small menu changes can support multiple objectives. By encouraging greater use of beans and pulses in school meals, the initiative aims to increase fibre intake, support healthier diets and introduce more sustainable ingredients into everyday eating. The campaign doesn’t rely on significant behaviour change as beans and pulses can often be incorporated into familiar dishes with minimal disruption to both students and catering staff.
This reflects a broader shift taking place across the industry. Future-ready operators are looking beyond simply offering healthier options and are instead focusing on how healthier choices can become the default.
Making sustainability work
Sustainability initiatives struggle when they require drastic behaviour change from consumers. Lasting change is more likely when sustainable choices are easier or require little to no extra effort from the consumer.
Compass Group’s partnership with Cauli is a strong example of this approach. Through replacing disposable cups and takeaway boxes with digitally-tracked reusable packaging, the partnership has already eliminated more than 383,000 single-use items, supporting Compass’s target to reduce single-use foodservice packaging by 30% by 2035. The initiative seeks to reduce single-use packaging waste while maintaining convenience for consumers and operational simplicity for operators.
Future-ready operators are no longer treating health, sustainability and resilience as separate priorities. Instead, they are looking for solutions that solve multiple challenges simultaneously. The businesses most likely to succeed over the next decade will build models that are healthier, greener and more resilient by design rather than reacting to changing expectations.
Implications for operators
Focus on incremental changes that are easy to implement. Small changes to menus, ingredients or service models can collectively have a significant impact without disrupting operations or asking too much of consumers.
Look for solutions that solve multiple challenges at once. Future-ready innovations should improve operational performance while also delivering health, sustainability or customer benefits.
Move from reacting to future challenges to planning for them. Health, sustainability and resilience should increasingly be embedded into long-term business strategy rather than addressed as standalone initiatives.
Implications for suppliers
Support operators with scalable health and nutrition solutions. Opportunities will grow for suppliers that can help operators provide personalised nutrition, healthier menus and products with clear functional benefits.
Position innovation around measurable business value. Future-fit initiatives will be easier for operators to adopt when suppliers can demonstrate benefits beyond sustainability or health alone, including efficiency, waste reduction, customer engagement or cost savings.
Help operators future-proof menus. Demand is likely to grow for ingredients that can improve nutrition, support sustainability goals and remain cost-effective.
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