Innovation at Future Food

Future Food Eating Lifestyle is the channel that connects the ecosystem directly to the customers, food entrepreneurs, and feeders. Future Food Eating Lifestyle is a relationship platform where the purpose and the meaning of the Future Food network’s larger mission is expressed.The Eating Lifestyle area of the Future Food ecosystem deals with studying new places and methods of consumption; educating and sensitizing the various market players in the food service; and supporting food realities in a process of conception, prototyping, and implementation of new solutions with the aim of innovating the food service sector and fighting the challenges of the future. Future Food Eating Lifestyle operates through consultancy, spin-offs development, and market validation platforms. The second area of innovation is Corporate innovation: that starts from benchmarking, need finding and goes towards ideation and prototyping. The prototyping process creates a tangible experience for target consumers with the goal of receiving constructive feedback on how to create the ideal product for the market. Through its work Future Food Network is constantly exposed to a number of signals, insights and therefore emerging trends globally. This advantage is making our team not only able to design, prototype and test new cutting-edge products for the industry, but also foresee what might come next. Innovation is also explored through our Food Alchemist Lab that is innovating in different ways. Upcycling: It was born from the idea that a need pushes the creativity to find solutions, and upcycling has been the best solution for its own needs. The key points lie on conceiving a raw material, an ingredient, a banana as a 100%. Research on fruits and veggies: Methodologies like enzymatic and non enzymatic transformation, fermentation, blackening… understood under the umbrella of science offer a wide range of possibilities when transforming and adding value to the lately mentioned “low value” products. Plant-based proteins exploration concerning flavor & texture, Non-alcoholic beverages and Knowledge Transfer are other key topics that we are tackling with our Food Alchemist Lab Team. In 2020, Future Food Eating Lifestyle carried on different consultancies supporting food products and services to improve their performance, increase turnover, scale, and innovate through a purpose-driven approach. The main services offered were: concept creation, financial sustainability, F&B Sourcing and menu engineering, consumer experience, marketing & Communication, HR, and management tools. The direct experience in the food service sector combined with the expertise of the Innovation, Education, and Community areas of the ecosystem, has opened up to numerous opportunities for new strategic partnerships and to the creation of valuable projects capable of pushing the boundaries and generating a positive impact.This year, Eating Lifestyle has carried out an important plant-based switch within its platforms and has also started a new project together with a social cooperative rethinking the food service sector in an inclusive way through the employment of disabled people.