Trends in Food Science & Technology 17 (2006) 184190

Viewpoint

Consumer-driven food product development

Anita R. Linnemann*, Marco Benner, Ruud Verkerk and Martinus A.J.S. van Boekel
Product Design and Quality Management Group, Department of Agrotechnology and Food Sciences, Wageningen University, P.O. Box 8129, 6700 EV Wageningen, The Netherlands (Fax: C31 317 483669; e-mail: anita.linnemann@wur.nl)
Food product development needs to be based on consumers needs and wishes to be successful. Factors that have become relevant in this respect are presented and their impact discussed, like mass-individualization, globalization and an altered interpretation of the food quality concept by consumers. Finally, structured approaches that can aid in the process of consumer-driven food product development are given.

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for instance, the increasing number of people who suffer from obesitas and the strong increase of the ageing population. Moreover, the development of new food products serves as a competitive tool for food companies and as such is a means to strengthen their position in the market. On a global scale, food product development is needed to provide growing populations with sufcient food of desired quality and also as a means to increase the sustainability of food supply systems. This article gives an overview of factors that are relevant for successful food product development and presents methods for structured ways to develop new foods. Reversal of the production chain The change from supply-based activities to demandbased industries has necessitated product designers to reverse their mode of operation from supplyorientated into demand-orientated (Linnemann, Meerdink, Meulenberg, & Jongen, 1999). This process is known as chain reversal. For many years the food market consisted of products that agricultural farmers and food processors offered for sale. Early buyers had the opportunity to select the best produce, whereas latecomers had to be content with what was left. Due to technological developments, like agricultural mechanization and the introduction of pesticides and chemical fertilizers, the production of raw materials went up drastically. Populations increased, but in developed countries the supply of food products increased even more. Markets became saturated, and consequently successful sales nowadays require a consumer-orientated approach; only if a product satises the demand of a consumer, a product can be successful in the market. Mass-individualisation Particular challenges in satisfying consumers demands and wishes are due to rapid demographical changes. Inuential demographical developments are a shift in the age prole of consumers, an increased inuence of ethnic groups in western societies and diversication of households. Eating habits have altered, for example, in households in which both partners have full-time jobs and also in the growing number of one-person households. Eating together at a xed time of the day is gradually being replaced by more individual meals at less specic times. In addition, many consumers tend to spend less time on

Introduction The food industry has come a long way in food product development. The rst large-scale activities concerned the preservation of food, so as to have food available outside the harvesting season. Later, food production became more uniform when production processes changed from traditional methods to mechanized, large-scale industrial processing. Similarities in the needs of consumers formed the basis of the success of the products that the newly developed industries offered. Nowadays, food product development is a continuous process that is of great concern to all companies active in this eld. Tomorrows consumer may not want the products that were in great demand yesterday, as a consequence of changing consumer needs. These changing needs are apparent in,
* Corresponding author.
0924-2244/$ - see front matter q 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.tifs.2005.11.015

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preparing their meals because of a higher work pressure, and more time allocated to sports and recreation (de Rooij, 2000; Tabaksblat, 1996). By 2010, it is expected that the 45 year olds and over will be the largest group in the Dutch society, representing 40% of the market (Tabaksblat, 1996). These consumers are characterised as being reasonably well off, having money to spend and with a growing interest in quality, service, security and safety. The younger generation, the 1844 year olds are expected to have a completely different lifestyle with unconventional eating habits that are described in terms as grazing, snacking and on-the-run consumption. They are critical consumers, looking for value for money, but above all they expect service and the opportunity to do or buy things at anytime, anywhere, anyhow. This group is individualistic and diverse, and it makes for a fragmented market. The ultimate implication here of was nicely expressed by a director of a Dutch supermarket chain, when he said that there are 15, 16, or 17 million markets in the Netherlands, depending on the number of independent individuals in the country (Andreae, 1995).

with social and environmental issues. Their perception of quality has deepened and broadened, and large groups of consumers also pay attention to the extrinsic quality determinants of the foods they buy. Globalisation An increasing amount of food products is consumed on other, in particular afuent, continents because of an increasing integration of developing-country rms into geographically dispersed supply networks or commodity chains. These chains link together producers, traders and processors in developing countries with retailers and consumers in developed countries (Geref & Korzeniewicz, 1994). In the past, overseas products mainly consisted of coffee, cacao, tea and other high-value, non-perishables like spices. Nowadays, international sourcing of perishable products to secure year-around supply is guaranteed through partnerships and long-term contracts. Retailers are devoting more and more shelf space to convenient high-quality fresh products, like vegetables and fruits that originate from far away production areas (Marsden & Wrigley, 1996). Chain approach A chain approach proved essential to efciently, i.e. with minimal time and costs, and effectively, i.e. in maximal accordance to the goal, incorporate consumers wishes in food product development (Jongen, Linnemann, & Dekker, 1999). In a food production chain, many actors may play a role: plant breeders, farmers, distributors, processors, marketers, retailers and consumers. In a consumer-orientated approach new product development will start with consumer and market research to identify the specic characteristics that a new food product has to have. The next step is to realise co-operation and information exchange among all the actors in the production chain. This gives rise to several new issues, like the question how the descriptive and qualitative terminology in which consumers express themselves can be translated into technological specications. New technologies Finally, the appropriate use of newly developed technologies is relevant for success in food product development. For an overview of innovative techniques in dehydration, preservation and packaging, please refer to the papers that were presented on these topics on the conference on Food Innovations for an Expanding Europe, 2729 October 2004 in Warsaw, Poland, and for new technologies in general to a review by van Boekel (1998). Food perception by consumers In the setting as described in the previous paragraphs, successful consumer-driven food product development

Broadening of the quality concept Consumers buy and consume products for a number of reasons. These reasons relate predominantly to the characteristics of the product, but they are also inuenced by, for instance, production methods. Therefore, end product quality cannot be described as such, but must be comprehended as the sum of a set of quality attributes, which can be divided into so-called intrinsic and extrinsic quality determinants (van Trijp & Steenkamp, 1998). Intrinsic quality determinants refer to physical product characteristics such as taste, texture and shelf life. These intrinsic factors can be measured in an objective manner, and some can also be determined by sensory perception, like the looks, the feel and the smell of a food. Texture, for example, can be dened in a physicalchemical way in terms of the composition of cell wall material and structure. Other intrinsic quality attributes are shape, nutritional value, freshness, safety and appearance. The combination of all these attributes together determines the intrinsic product quality. Extrinsic factors relate to the way in which the food was produced, like the use of pesticides, the absence of child labour, fair trade regulations, animal-friendliness, the type of packaging material, a specic processing technology or the use of genetically modied organisms during the production of ingredients. These extrinsic factors commonly have no direct inuence on the characteristics of the product, but they can be of overriding importance in the purchasing policy of some consumers. In the past, intrinsic determinants were decisive in the buying decisions of consumers. Nowadays, however, consumers are more knowledgeable due to better education and improved information supply, and are more concerned

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Fig. 1. Food perception by consumers (Sijtsema, Linnemann, van Gaasbeek, Dagevos, & Jongen, 2002).

resembles the task of hitting a moving target. The complexity of the goal to produce exactly that food that is positively perceived by the consumer, is illustrated in Fig. 1. Not only characteristics of the individual and the food product are important, but also variables related to the context in which the food is to be consumed, like time and place, and environmental variables like the family background and societal features. Categories of new food products Food products introduced as new by food companies, can be classied into the following categories (Anon, 1999; Fuller, 1994; Luning, Marcelis, & Jongen, 2002): Me-too products. A me-too product is a product that is basically the same as an existing one, but produced by another company. This category of new products represents the largest group of new food products. Line extensions. These are new variants of a wellknown product. Typical examples are new avours for existing products or new tastes in a family of products. The design process of these products can be characterized by relatively little effort and development time, small changes in the manufacturing process, little change in marketing strategy and a minor impact on storage and/or handling techniques. Repositioned existing products. These are current products that are again promoted in order to reposition the product. For example, by the increased attention for health products, a margarine brand was repositioned because of its natural high content of tocopherol (Vitamine E). The development time for repositioned products can be minimal and only the marketing department should put efforts in capitalizing the niche market.

New form of existing products. These are existing products that have altered to another form (e.g. solved, granulated, concentrated, spreadable, dried or frozen). For instance, dried soups. These products may require an extensive development time because the physical properties of the product change drastically. Reformulation of existing products. This group concerns known products with a new formula. Reasons for reformulation can be reducing costs of ingredients, irregular supply of certain raw materials, or the availability of new ingredients with improved characteristics. Examples are products with better colour, improved avour, more bres, less fat, etc. The design process for these products is usually inexpensive and needs a relatively short development time. However, for food products minor changes in composition might have great consequences, for e.g. the chemical or microbial shelf life. New packaging of existing products. This involves accepted products with new packaging concepts. For example, the technique of modied atmosphere packaging created opportunities to extend the shelf life of many food products. With respect to the design process, products may have to be reformulated for the new application (e.g. microwave packaging). Moreover, new packaging concepts may require expensive packaging equipment. Innovative products. These are dened as products resulting from changes in an existing product otherwise than described above. The changes must have an added value. The design process is generally longer and more expensive when more product changes are required. Marketing can also be costly because consumers may have to be educated to the novelty. However, in some cases time and costs of

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innovation are relatively little, e.g. in the case of a successful innovative ready-to-cook product which was made by assembling frozen vegetables and a frozen pastry on a tray. Creative products, also called true new products. This type of products is described as one newly brought into existence, i.e. a never-before seen product. Typical examples are novel protein foods (or meat replacers) that are produced from vegetable proteins. Creative products commonly require extensive product development, tend to be costly (much marketing effort, new equipment) and have a high failure chance.

Success and failure in food product development Based on weekly turnover in Euros, Koomen (2003) listed the most successful food introductions on the Dutch market in 2002. Most successful products were either drinks or desserts. The majority of these innovations (approximately 65%) are line-extensions aiming at variation. Most of the variations are different tastes. Failure is, however, more common in food product development than success. Two out of three new products never live to see their second year on the shelves (Anon, 1999). The number of products that never make it through the rst stages of the product development process is even higher. According to Lord (2000), 72% of true new products and 55% of line extensions fail. From the 1935 new products introduced by the biggest 20 US food companies with the most new product introductions in 1995, 174 were truly new and 1761 were line extensions. The new items experienced a success rate of 52% while line extensions had a 78% success rate, combining for an overall success rate of 76%. Non-leading, smaller companies introduced 14,298 products and achieved a success rate of only 12%, leading to the conclusion that bigger companies have a higher success rate with new products than smaller companies (Lord, 2000). To improve the chances of success in new product development, the traditional cook-and-look (or trial-anderror) approaches are being replaced by new, structured methodologies. Consumer wishes can be the basis of such a structured approach, but it is also possible to start with an existing product. An example of the former is Quality Function Deployment (QFD) and the application of Goldenbergs creativity templates forms an illustration of the latter approach.

(Goldenberg & Mazursky, 2002). The method to achieve this starts by (1) listing all the individual components of the selected product. For milk these could be: water, protein, fat, vitamins, mineralsdepending on the level of detail that you want to apply. The next step is (2) to use one of Goldenbergs templates on the listed components, for example the template subtraction. Assume that water is subtracted from the components of milk. Then (3) describe or visualize the resulting product, and (4) think of possible advantages. For milk without water, so milk powder, this would be, for instance, that it is much easier to transport and carry than milk with water, and it is preserved as well. The last step of the process is (5) to look at possible obstacles of your new concept. At this point you have the liberty to make the adjustments that you consider necessary to achieve the feasibility of the new product. In total, Goldenberg and Mazursky (2002) have dened ve creativity templates, namely: (1) Subtraction: instead of trying to improve a product by adding components or attributes, remove them, especially those that seem desirable. Classical example: dried soup. (2) Multiplication: instead of taking away elements, make one or more copies of an existing product component, but then alter those copies in some important way. Example: a manufacturer of toothbrushes sells packages each containing four brushes, namely one for each season, with the idea that no one will now forget to replace his or her brush in time. (3) Division: divide an existing product into its components, and recongure those parts in an unanticipated way. Example: the traditional way to sell spices in the Dutch supermarkets is in little pots or bags containing 3050 g. Recently, spices became available in plastic strips that contain four compartments with half a teaspoon each. The reason for a consumer to buy the spices in small quantities, is that the spice will maintain its fragrance until the moment it is used. (4) Task unication: assign a new task to an existing element of the product or its environment, thereby unifying two tasks in a single component. Example: household gloves with chamomile cream inside. So, while doing the dirty work, your hands are simultaneously nourished with moisturizing cream. (5) Attribute dependency change: change the dependencies of attributes of a product and attributes of its immediate environment; try to nd new dependencies. Example: sunglasses of which the lens tint alters with changing light conditions. Ongoing research indicates that the use of creativity templates in food product development is particularly useful to get more complex products accepted by the consumer

Creativity templates The philosophy behind Goldenbergs creativity templates is that radical changes are likely to be rejected, and minor ones ignored; a successful innovation must at the same time be both new and easy to comprehend

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consists of several so-called rooms, each containing information on the product that is under investigation. The main goal is to translate the consumer demands into specied product requirements. The basic structure of the House of Quality is presented in Fig. 2. The voice of the consumer (WHATs) The rst room of the House of Quality consists of a set of decisive consumer demands, briey described as the WHATs. These demands are also known as the Voice of the Consumer or the desired quality characteristics of the product. The information on consumer demands is usually obtained by market research, focus group interviews and other means to assess consumer priorities. The WHATs are often, at least initially, described in the consumers own words, and may therefore be vague and general. Consumer requirements need to be clearly dened before they are inserted in the House of Quality. Other consumer wants are not verbalised, but are obtained by observation (Hofmeister, 1991). Product requirements (HOWs) Once the relevant consumer requirements are identied, each of these must be elaborated to explain what a particular demand will imply for the technological characteristics of the product itself: WHATs must be translated into product requirements, also called the HOWs. The HOWs should be measurable properties that describe the desired consumer want in the technical language of the company. A HOW in the House of Quality should be read as: how to measure and not as how to achieve. Relationship matrix The centre part of the House of Quality contains the relationships between the WHATs and the HOWs

Fig. 2. The house of quality, the rst matrix of the quality function deployment method.

(Michaut, van Kleef, & van Trijp, 2004). The use of templates provides the consumer with something familiar in the new product, which helps to accept the new trait in the new product. The templates also make clear that marketing people and food technologists need to work together in the eld of food product development; one has to be knowledgeable about the food matrix before one is able to subtract or multiply components. Quality function deployment QFD was developed in the late sixties in Japan to support the product design process of large ships at Mitsubishis Kobe shipyard. As it evolved, it became clear that it could also be used to support service development. QFD has been extended to apply to any planning process where a team wants to systematically prioritize their possible solutions to a given set of objectives (Urban & Hauser, 1993). Benner, Linnemann, Jongen, and Folstar (2003) reviewed the available literature on the use of QFD as a tool to improve consumer-driven food product development. The conclusion of this review is that the rst matrix of the QFD method, the so-called House of Quality, has certain merits that make its application in the food industry constructive. The use of the complete, i.e. Four-Phase QFD method, however, is restricted by the complexity of food products, the many interactions between the ingredients and the inuence of processes on functional properties of the product, which together cause food products to vary in time. House of quality The rst matrix of the QFD method is called the Product Planning Matrix, or also House of Quality, because of its contents and the fact that its appearance resembles the sketch of a house. The House of Quality

Fig. 3. The quality change modelling approach applied to a food production chain.

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Fig. 4. Illustration of quality change modelling for the sweetness of plantain.

section. This so-called relationship matrix provides a crosscheck, since it may not contain empty rows or columns. An empty row indicates that the company has omitted to specify a product requirement that is necessary to meet a consumer demand regarding the product. An empty column implies that one of the technical product requirements does not contribute to the consumer demands with respect to the product. In the relationship matrix symbols can be used to indicate the strengths of the relationships between a particular consumer demand and a product requirement. Usually four levels of strengths are applied, namely strong (CC ), medium (C), weak (CK) and none (0). Correlation matrix (the roof of the house) On top of the House of Quality is a triangular table, which is called the correlation matrix. This roof-like table shows the correlations that exist between the different product requirements. A change in a particular product requirement that is related to another product requirement will usually affect both requirements. Correlations identied in the roof indicate areas where trade-off decisions and research and development are needed. Here too, symbols can be used to indicate the nature and the strength of the correlations. Strong positive correlations imply that an improvement in one product requirement supports another. This information offers the opportunity to use research funds efciently by avoiding duplication of efforts to achieve the same result. Strong negative correlations demand attention because they represent conditions in which trade-off decisions may be needed.

Objective target values (HOW MUCHs) The cellar of the House of Quality contains the HOW MUCHs. Here, target values are given for all product requirements (HOWs). The HOW MUCHs should explicitly represent the consumer demands and certainly not the current performance levels of the product. Consequently, the HOW MUCH section of the House of Quality provides univocal objectives to guide the subsequent optimisation process. Quality change modelling With the House of Quality the most important consumer demands can be translated into tangible product requirements. A method to incorporate these product requirements into a production chain and assess opportunities for optimization, is quality change modelling (QCM) (Linnemann, van Boekel, & Verkerk, 2004). Consumer preferences form the starting point of this approach, in addition to legal requirements that aim to protect health of the consumers. The consumer preferences and legal requirements (the WHATs) are the required quality attributes for the QCM approach, and the product requirements are the performance indicators (Fig. 3). The HOW MUCH values from the House of Quality represent the desired, quantitative ranges for the performance indicators. The stepwise approach of QCM is as follows: (1) denition of the production chain, (2) assessment of consumer preferences, (3) construction of the House of Quality, and (4) quality change modelling. During this last step, changes in the requirements as inuenced by environmental conditions such as temperature, need to be established. Fig. 4 illustrates how sweetness of

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A.R. Linnemann et al. / Trends in Food Science & Technology 17 (2006) 184190 Hofmeister, K. R. (1991). Quality function deployment: Market success through customer driven products. In E. Graf, & I. S. Saguy (Eds.), Food product development: From concept to the market place (pp. 189210). New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold. Jongen, W. M. F., Linnemann, A. R., & Dekker, M. (1999). Producten procestechnologie [Product and proces technology]. In Werkende ketens (pp. 2834). Houten: Keesing Noordervliet. Koomen, L. (2003). Intro Top 20: de beste introducties van 2002: zuivel en dranken domineren intro-aanbod [Intro top 20: The best introductions of 2002; dairy and drinks dominate introoffer]. Food Magazine, 59(April), 3439. Linnemann, A. R., Meerdink, G., Meulenberg, M. T. G., & Jongen, W. M. F. (1999). Consumer-oriented technology development. Trends in Food Science and Technology, 9, 409414. Linnemann, A. R., van Boekel, M. A. J. S., & Verkerk, R. (2004). Consumer-orientated tool for the optimisation of international agro-food supply chains working document 2. Proceedings, research workshop in Heredia, Costa Rica. Project: Improved sustainability of agro-food chains in Central America (pp. 7685). Tilburg, The Netherlands: Development Research Institute. Lord, J. B. (2000). New product failure and success. In A. L. Brody, & J. B. Lord (Eds.), Developing new products for a changing market place (pp. 5586). Lancaster: Technomic. Luning, P. A., Marcelis, W. J., & Jongen, W. M. F. (2002). Food quality management: A techno-managerial approach (323 pp.). Wageningen: Wageningen Pers. Marsden, T., & Wrigley, N. (1996). Retailing, the food system and the regulatory state. In N. Wrigley, & N. Lowe (Eds.), Retailing, consumption and capital: Towards the new retail; geography (pp. 3347). Harlow: Longman. Michaut, A. M. K., van Kleef, E., & van Trijp, J. C. M. (2004). Bring structure, make it simple! Template-based products overcome initial product complexity. 33rd European marketing academy conference (Extended abstract). Sijtsema, S., Linnemann, A., van Gaasbeek, T., Dagevos, H., & Jongen, W. (2002). Variables inuencing food perception reviewed for consumer-oriented product development. Critical Reviews in Food Science and Nutrition, 42(6), 565581. Tabaksblat, M. (1996). New demands, new technologies, new foods: The challenges facing the European food industry. World Food Regulation Review, 5(11), 1720. Trijp, J. C. M., & Steenkamp, J. E. B. M. (1998). Consumeroriented new product development: Principles and practice. In W. M. F. Jongen, & M. T. G. Meulenberg (Eds.), Innovation of food production systems (pp. 3766). Wageningen: Wageningen Pers. Urban, G. L., & Hauser, J. R. (1993). Design and marketing of new products (2nd ed.) (701 pp.). London: Prentice-Hall. van Boekel, M. A. J. S. (1998). Developments in technologies for food production. In W. M. F. Jongen, & M. T. G. Meulenberg (Eds.), Innovation of food production systems (pp. 87116). Wageningen: Wageningen Pers.

plantain, which is a consumer preference for this product, can be characterized by variety and contents of soluble sugars, organic acids and water. Determining the inuence of temperature, time, relative humidity and gas conditions on these throughout the production chain indicates where circumstances can be optimized to nally deliver a product that meets consumer preferences. Conclusion Consumer-driven food product development is a must for food companies to stay in the market. In this process the companies have to take account of societal changes, like mass-individualization, globalisation and broadening of the quality concept, while also keeping track of possible new technologies that offer opportunities for their product range. Nowadays, many new product introductions still fail. Promising methodologies to improve the success rate of product development are based on structured techniques, starting from consumer wishes, like Quality Function Deployment, or on the basis of an existing product, such as the application of Goldenbergs creativity templates. Close cooperation between marketers and food technologists is imperative to be successful in the application of these methods, but also in consumer-driven food product development in general. References
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