2024 in grocery: Seven trends that influenced food and drink innovation

The Sidemen’s meteoric rise 

YouTube collective The Sidemen’s seven members (Miniminter, TBJZL, KSI, Vikkstar123, W2S, Behzinga and Zerkaa) have amassed 146.2 million followers combined. 

To date, their business ventures have included a clothing line, trading cards and casual dining chain Sides. Now, they’re hoping to crack the world of grocery.

After debuting their spirits brand XIX Vodka back in 2021, The Sidemen expanded into a swathe of new categories in 2024.

The first product to launch was Best Cereal, which hit Tesco in March. Made in partnership with Mornflake, two non-HFSS variants, Choco Crunch and Caramel Gold (rsp: £2/275g), rolled into the retailer to much fanfare, selling 500,000 packs in the first three months.

They then hit Iceland and Morrisons in June – with Best even chosen as the official cereal supplier to ITV’s Love Island villa.

Best Cereal was followed by the launch of ambient meat snacking brand, Sides.

Created in collaboration with New World Foods, Buffalo Chicken, Chipotle Steak Strips and Korean BBQ Steak Strips are made with halal meat and feature flavours inspired by the sauces available in the collective’s Sides restaurants (rsp: £2.50/35g). They rolled into 3,000 Tesco and 1,000 One Stop stores nationwide in April. 

In June, The Sidemen launched a 15-strong frozen range – spanning sauces, chicken  wings, and BBQ ribs – exclusively into Iceland and Food Warehouse stores, also under the Sides brand. 

The unmissable Wicked press tour

If you spent any time online this year, coverage for the Wicked press tour was unavoidable. Overly emotional interview clips of the movie’s stars Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande went viral on TikTok, while the pair were snapped at various press events in impeccably styled pink and green outfits.

Even for those who stay off social media, the marketing team at Universal Pictures made sure the film’s release in November wouldn’t go unnoticed. It partnered with Robinsons to launch two limited-edition, iridescent squash variants inspired by the film’s main characters Elphaba (Erivo) and Glinda (Grande).

The squashes, Amazafying Citrus Twist and Outstandiful Berry, launched into retailers under Robinsons’ Double Concentrate range (rsp: £2.25/750ml) in October.

Robinsons installed augmented reality “magic mirrors” in selected Tesco stores, transforming shoppers into either Elphaba or Glinda in real time. Participants were also given free themed straws and entered into a prize draw.

Butterkist hoped to cash in on the excitement around Wicked’s release as well. It launched a limited-edition 180g Sweet popcorn sharing pack and rolled out Wicked themed designs on sharing and PMP packs with an on-pack promotion throughout October, offering shoppers the chance to win a “Thrillifying adventure to London”.

Demand for US snacking brands

TikTok has been influencing shoppers’ snacking habits for several years. From ultra-spicy Takis to Van Holten’s Pickle-in-a-Pouch, UK consumers can’t seem to get enough of filming themselves trying US snacks in particular.

It’s no surprise, then, that several more US snacking brands have made their way across the pond over the past 12 months.

Case in point: Mars launched its US frozen, chocolate-dipped fruit brand Trü Frü in the UK in March. In the same month, PepsiCo brought its Extra Flamin’ Hot brand platform across the pond, launching ultra-spicy versions of Walkers Max, Doritos and Wotsits Crunchy for British consumers. 

Then, Fox’s Burton’s Companies UK brought American candy Nerds Gummy Clusters to the UK in July, following “booming success in the US”.

Kellanova debuted its $1bn (£789m) snacking brand Cheez-It in Britain in August to much fanfare, with the ambition of making it bigger than Pringles. Specifically, it launched Cheez-It Snap’d, “thin and crispy” baked chips with “curvy and crispy edges”, which hit the US in 2019. The snacks were “tweaked for European tastebuds”, debuting in Cheese & Chilli and Double Cheese flavours.

Korea’s growing cultural influence

K-food has been gaining popularity in the UK for some years now, thanks to the influence of Korean pop culture and a boom in home cooking over lockdown.

Ocado gave Korean cuisine its vote of confidence in October 2023, adding 50 new products to its Korean range. Sainsbury’s then listed Jinro soju, Korea’s leading spirits brand, in December 2023.

In the same month, Wagamama unveiled a new Korean-inspired menu and Mintel predicted tteokbokki (simmered Korean ricecakes) would become one of our favourite snacks in 2024. Their confidence doesn’t appear to have been misplaced.

In February 2024, Tesco listed 20 new SKUs from Korean food brand Sun Hee, spanning cooking sauces, noodle bowls and meal kits. Over the summer, Itsu launched two Korean-inspired cooking sauces – Gochujang and Korean BBQ (£2.50/200ml) – into Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Waitrose.

In October, M&S added two tteokbokki variants (rsp: £4/350g) – Sweet & Spicy and Katsu – under its Taste of Asia range.

A coup for blue soft drinks 

Innocent was something of a pioneer when it launched its Bolt From The Blue juice in 2019. Containing apple, guava and coconut water, its unique colour comes from a type of algae called spirulina. 

Tropicana followed Innocent’s lead with the launch of a lookalike product, Fuel for Thought, in 2022, also containing spirulina. However, it wasn’t until 2024 that blue soft drinks really hit the mainstream, when Lucozade and Pepsi launched their own versions.

Lucozade unveiled blue variants for its Sport, Energy and Alert drinks in February (from £1/500ml), after The Grocer reported it had trademarked the phrase ‘Blucozade’ in 2023.

In June, Pepsi added a limited-edition blue cola called Pepsi Electric (rsp: £1.99/500ml). 

(More!) celeb-backed drinks brands

Celebrities launching their own drinks brands is by no means a new trend. However, innovations and new retail listings saw new A-listers’ alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks brands come to the fore in 2024. 

Rod Stewart and Rapper Aitch (real name Harrison Armstrong) kicked things off. The former secured a Tesco listing for his blended scotch whisky brand Wolfie’s Whisky (rsp: £35/70cl), which rolled into 400 stores in January.

Meanwhile, Aitch launched his seltzer brand Syps into Iceland in the same month. Comprising Strawberry, Peach and Lemon & Lime, the zero-sugar, zero-calorie range (rsp: £1.50/330ml) rolled into 1,200 Iceland and Food Warehouse stores nationwide.

Next, Lewis Hamilton brought his alcohol-free agave-based ‘spirit’ Almave to the UK via spirits distributor Mangrove Global. The Blue Agave Spirit (rsp: £36/70cl) landed on Amazon and House of Malt in May. Pernod Ricard  took a minority stake in Almave in August.

RTD cocktail brand Gin & Juice by Dre and Snoop hit the UK in June, rolling into independent stores as well as DTC and Amazon (rsp: £2.50/250ml).

Rounding off the year, Margot Robbie’s gin brand Papa Salt (42.8% abv) made its UK debut through an exclusive tie-up with Harvey Nichols in June, and secured a Tesco listing in October (rsp: £39/70cl).

The viral ‘Dubai chocolate’ craze 

Chocoholics around the globe have their sights set on a particularly fancy chocolate bar: Fix’s Can’t Get Knafeh of It tablet, available exclusively in Dubai. 

The treat, which centres on traditional Middle Eastern pastry dessert knafeh with pistachio and tahini – all encased in hand-painted milk chocolate – is the the brainchild of British-Egyptian entrepreneur  Sarah Hamouda who, inspired by her pregnancy cravings, launched her business Fix Dessert Chocolatier in 2021.

Now, thanks to ASMR and foodie influencers filming themselves eating the ultra-indulgent bar and posting it to TikTok, #dubaichocolate has become a viral sensation. At the time of writing, the hashtag had been attached to 143.2k posts on TikTok, while Fix Dessert had amassed 349.6k TikTok followers.

No wonder, then, that UK chocolate brands want a piece of the action.

Love Cocoa founder James Cadbury told The Grocer in September he was developing “something like” Fix’s elaborate chocolate bars. “A lot of the new product development launches we’ll be doing will be around pistachio,” he said. 

Lindt this month unveiled its own Dubai Style Chocolate bar, available in selected UK stores while stocks last.