What is your view of the global food industry today?

There’s a huge amount of change taking place in the food industry right now. A lot of the younger generation are dissatisfied with the big, established food and drinks corporations and you have a lot of small start-up food companies entering the sector to meet the needs of these consumers. An interesting dichotomy has developed where big food corporations are trying to appear small, while smaller start-ups want to be big.

Are Irish food companies reacting to these changes?

I think food and drinks businesses in Ireland and the UK are leading the way when it comes to this change and developing new innovations in food. There’s been a huge explosion in the number of start-up food and drinks companies emerging from Ireland and the UK in recent years. This means the food industry is very competitive today but competition is a healthy thing.

What are the big food trends you see today?

Health and wellness is no longer a trend as it has become mainstream. Five or six years ago, when we talked about selling protein, it was aimed at young, male body builders and gym goers. Today, protein is mass market and has become a lot more female friendly.

I think if I was investing in a food business today, I’d find the healthy snacking category very interesting. If you can combine convenience with health you will meet a lot of consumer needs. The days of three square meals are a thing of the past. On top of this, there’s no doubt that plant-based and vegan foods are huge trends today. Flexitarian diets means consumers are reducing their meat intake.

How do you scale a small start-up food business?

In order to scale your food business, you need real ambition to scale quickly and aggressively. That may seem obvious, but many start-up food companies lack the ambition to scale very quickly. You have to want to build a national brand.

On top of this, you need to be prepared to invest ahead of the curve. You need to invest heavily in building awareness of your food or drinks brand. With a retail brand, you spend all your life getting product on the shelf and then off the shelf. So you’re selling to the retailer and the consumer. That means you need to spend a lot of money, effort and time to generate awareness of your brand. That is key to scaling your business.

How important is a brand in the food industry?

It’s critical your food brand communicates very clearly the benefits of the product to the target audience. You also need to be really clear who your target consumer is. In order to scale aggressively, business owners need to understand they will have to invest money they basically don’t have in building brand awareness. That means you have to bring in investment from outside. You also need to develop a marketing playbook of all the things you can do to raise awareness of your company. You can easily spend €10,000 on marketing and not get very far, so you have to be really smart in how you target consumers.