It's a small world

When I last visited Disneyland some years ago (yes, I’ve been more than once), it was with friends whose six-year-old daughter insisted we go on the “It’s a Small World” ride many, many times.

For the sake of those who haven’t experienced this ride I won’t go into details, for it is best experienced without preconceptions (though you could try picturing one of Dante’s circles of hell reimagined by Enid Blyton). It is, however, virtually impossible to come out the other side without the accompanying song stuck in your head like some pre-school version of The Final Countdown.

“It’s a small world after all, it’s a small world after all,” it repeats, and repeats, and repeats.

Mercifully, my mind had been free of the song for years – but the tune has returned many times over the past 48 hours.

I have spent the past two days with grocery industry experts from around the globe. We came to Paris from as far away as China and New Zealand as part of the Sial World Tour, which recognises leading product innovation and food & drink trends.

This includes selecting standout examples of new product development and, while these can’t be revealed until the Sial trade show is held in France in October, I can say I learned that many of the trends shaping the UK grocery market are also influencing the industry in other parts of the globe.

These included demand for more convenient products and retail concepts in developed countries where consumers are increasingly time-poor.

And time and again, for example, we heard how consumers were dining out less and cooking more at home; leading to further development of concepts such as meal kits, cocktail kits or prepared veg to put straight onto the barbecue. There were exceptions of course, with the delegate for India saying his country still took a traditional approach to home cooking, but it is a growing trend in many parts of the world.

Health and nutrition concerns came up often – particularly in reference to obesity, but also with regards to the development of food and drink for an aging global population. Among the products discussed were a Brazilian canned soft drink fortified with fibre; and kids’ iced lollies made from fruit and decaffeinated tea that are proving a hit in Canada. Not surprisingly, many European experts mentioned how the horsemeat scandal had led to greater demand from consumers to understand what was in the food they were eating.

Greek yoghurt was mentioned many times over the two days. This was accompanied by nervous glances towards the Greek representative when someone forgot to describe yoghurt produced outside Greece as ‘Greek-style’ (she took it in good humour – though was unimpressed by US brands adopting Greek words as a name). In the US, by the way, Greek yoghurt has leapt beyond the yoghurt fixture and is now to be found as dressings and dips.

And, oddly reassuring for a British lad away from home (I don’t get out much), were the familiar little things: how radler-style shandy beers were a growing trend in countries including Portugal and The Netherlands as they are here at the moment; how consumers who wouldn’t know John Torode from John Major are inspired by their local version of Masterchef; and how Argentina has recently developed its first dry cider.

It seems apt that it took a meeting in a Paris – a croissant’s throw from a Disneyland park – to bring home to me that grocery can be a small world.