This Is Not A Trend Report. This is a “How to Make the Health Trends Work for Your Brand” report.

The subtitle of our Global Game Changers Reports is Trends – Consumers - Brands. 

It means that we focus on How ToAnalyse Trends Correctly, How ToTarget The Right Consumer Motivation and finally How ToPosition Your Brand. As leading international experts in positioning and repositioning of brands in the global market for nutrition, health and wellness, this is what we normally do for our clients. 

To do this effectively in our consulting we use our proprietary FourFactors? Brand Acceleration System, to guide our clients through the critical decisions leading to a successful launch. For the same reason we are using the FourFactors as a framework in this report.

Fast Forward to The Mass Market!

In this 2021 report we will focus on what drives trends from lifestyle niches into the mass market, what will motivate the Early Mass Market consumers to accept new ideas and then how to position your brand for Early Mass Market success. Across the report you will find references to our 2019 and 2020 reports where we analyzed Lifestyle trends, Lifestyle consumer narratives and rules and examples of Lifestyle brand positioning.

Part 1: How to Analyse Trends Correctly

What we often hear from our clients is that trends can create confusion and internal debate about what trends will actually have an impact on your brand and your category. So to create an orientation we use the Global Game Changers to identify the major macro trends that is driving a paradigm shift from “pharma for health” to “food for health”. This shift is driven by a growing Academic and Public understanding of the role of Nutritionfor health. In this context the Covid 19 pandemic can be seen as the ultimate gamechanger – there is no medicine! And the risk of serious consequences and even dying increases with “underlying health conditions such as overweight, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases and lung related conditions caused by eg excessive smoking”. 

The message? Your health is your responsibility. The result? Covid 19 has accelerated all health trends. So in the first part we will not only identify what Game Changers that have fast forwarded in to the Mass market, and what trends they have generated. We will also describe what key Lifestyle trends that have pushed them over the “Crossroads from Niche to Mass”.

Part 2: How to Target the Right Consumer Motivation

In this year’s report we present new research into mass market consumer motivations and drivers from our cooperation with Lund university, Sweden and their international Master Course in Applied Cultural Analysis (MACA). As a result of this research we can present “The Triggers And Barriers For Mass Market Entry” and specifically how these applies to the fast growing market for plant based foods and proteins with examples of application. We will also clarify the critical difference between the motivations of the Lifestyle consumer and the Early Mass Market Consumer. In the context of the plant-based market we clarify the difference between the Ethically motivated Veganactivist consumers and the Solution oriented Flexitariansand how the triggers and barriers applies to plant based choices.

Part 3: How to Position Your Brand for Mass Market Growth

As a category grows fueled by a positive new trend it is tempting for established brands to enter. But this where you must be careful with the choice of brand strategy. Shall you enter with your old brand, a sub brand or create a new brand? Or is the emerging category so distant from your current brands that you must chose to acquire a brand? The answer to the brand question is to understand where the category is in relation to your Brand Innovation Space. I.e. where the brand is positioned in the mind of your consumer target. So in this section we will clarify and exemplify the different Rules to Play for a Lifestyle brand compared with an Early Mass market brand. We will also demonstrate how to grow your brand by a “revolving” strategy which means a constant innovation in new trends.

Plant based special: From Vegans to Flexitarians

Nowhere is growth demonstrated better than in the plant based category where the early entrants were activist brands who challenge the meat and dairy industry and who bond with the beliefs of the ethical consumer most often self-defined as Vegans who would never buy a plant based product from a meat or dairy producer. So, is the plant-based category exclusive for the Oatlys of the world? No, on the contrary, what we see now is how the plant-based category quickly grows in to the mass-market driven by health and sustainability and climate trends which makes it accessible for the Flexitarian mass market consumer. Plant based choices becomes “the right thing to do” and when delivered with taste and convenience in well-known product formats and eventually from well-known brands in your normal shopping environment then they end up in your shopping basket.

See our website www.thehmt.com for more information and to download a preview of the report.