Why 80% of food innovations fail

Why do so many food innovations stall within one year of launch? According to industry figures, at least eighty percent of all new food concepts fail. Not due to a lack of creativity or technology, but because of insufficient insight into actual consumer behavior. In Northeast Brabant, that observation is now being followed up in a concrete way. With support from the Regio Deal ’t Goeie Leven, the Consumer Behaviour Lab is scaling up its approach.

The Consumer Behaviour Lab is a collaboration between HAS green academy and Bamboo Brands. Over the next four years, the initiative will support dozens of food start-ups and scale-ups in improving the market viability of their innovations. This takes place within the regional startup ecosystem of AgriFoodCapital.

Behavior instead of assumptions

Many innovations fail because they are tested too late or too narrowly with potential buyers. The focus is often on intentions and opinions, while actual behavior lags behind. The Consumer Behaviour Lab therefore works with so-called Ontdek-Onderzoek. In this approach, consumer behavior is measured in realistic environments, such as retail and catering.

“Innovation often goes wrong because entrepreneurs test their innovation too late or too limited with potential buyers,” say Antien Zuidberg and Theo Toering. “With the Consumer Behaviour Lab, we introduce an important validation step based on behavior rather than opinions into the innovation process.”

This approach gives entrepreneurs a more realistic view of their concept at an earlier stage. As a result, failure costs are reduced and the risk of production damage, food waste, and unnecessary use of energy and materials decreases. With the new boost, the lab is also expanding its activities to non-food and food-tech and data innovations.

Concrete support for entrepreneurs

Within the program, 47 vouchers will be made available to food start-ups and scale-ups in the region. With a voucher, entrepreneurs gain access to professional consumer behavior research. The studies are carried out by HAS students, under the supervision of the Design Methoden in Food research group and experts from Bamboo Brands.

In addition, there is room for in-depth projects with graduating students. The Consumer Behaviour Lab is also launching a pilot study focused on a non-food innovation. At the same time, the lab serves as a learning environment for students. The insights gained are incorporated into education, trade publications, and scientific articles.

Consumerbehaviourlab.nl