‘Consumers want better than what they’re being served now’

Consumers will flock to the first entrepreneur to offer a trustworthy alternative to match the scale of the global food multiples, says Dutch food industry analyst Bart Doorneweert.

“Food scandals like the horse meat incident sensitise consumers for alternative propositions they can trust,” says Mr Doorneweert. “The first entrepreneur or food company to provide trust in a scalable, innovative way, will make significant headway, impacting the operations of incumbents.

“Ireland has a natural disposition for some interesting value propositions. Branding could be part of the solution. A word of warning though: focus on making your product a unique experience to consumers. Quality schemes are important for internal arrangements, but consumers generally consider these to be a basic condition for purchase; a given. It’s not what they find compelling.”