How To Innovate To Make Your Brand A Big Hit

Consumers are eager for innovation when it comes to packaged goods and are interested in trying new food products at the grocery store. This shows immense opportunity for manufacturers and retailers to offer consumers something fresh. Innovation and new products spark excitement in the consumer and generate more opportunities for buying regardless of the shopping channel or medium. New products are the lifeblood of retailing – they infuse verve into existing lines, create completely new categories, and fulfill unmet needs not previously on consumers’ or retailers’ radar. It is not surprising that brands today are continuously looking to the wider food and drinks market to spot trends early on and promote continuous development of more experiential, convenient and innovative product propositions.

- Sanjay Kumar

The food and beverage industry in India is currently on the verge of momentous trends that are both transformative and disruptive. The most pronounced of these trends is buoyant growth of the consumer packaged goods (CPG) industry over the past quarter century, which has been nothing short of exhilarating. Riding on the crest of success, CPG companies have launched innovative products to meet an ever-growing array of consumer needs and desires.

While product launches have been taking place at a fast clip, companies have also had to constantly innovate to differentiate their products from others. Indeed, innovation is key when it comes to addressing the challenges in the F&B sector. These include having to cope with rapidly changing consumer needs, shortened product life cycles, margin pressures, and rising technological advancements. Innovation-led new product development, thus, plays an important role and acts as a growth driver for the industry.

Innovation is viewed as the application of better solutions that meet new requirements, unarticulated needs of consumers, or existing market needs. This is accomplished through better products, processes, services, technologies, or business models that are readily available to markets, governments and society. Innovation is a wide concept which aside from creating, launching and marketing new products also includes improving shopping processes, providing consumers with a range of tools to purchase products and ensuring that the entire organization is focused on the singular goal of improving the customer’s overall experience. As Indian consumers become more global in their aspirations and desires, as they travel abroad and are exposed to global products, their appetite to consume products in their home market will only increase.

Newer players are faster on food innovations