From recent safaris and store visits, we share some of our latest themes, trends and insights ahead of our September 15th safari. If you want to join our safari, get in touch or book your place here. Continuing expansion: Salad Project, atis, Farmer J If you've spent much time in London recently, you've probably spotted at least one of these fresh focused, quality oriented bowl (and fieldtray) specialists. And if you visited recently, your chances of coming across one wil

Across Europe there's a lot under way across the food-to-go landscape. Here we focus on some of the concepts that gave impressed us recently across the DACH region - with some great things under way across Germany, Switzerland and Austria. Building upon and beyond heritage products There is a longstanding tradition of bakery feeding into the German food-to-go opportunity in particular, and the combination of bakery and coffee has been a key emphasis over many years. Sausage,

From our global supermarket analysis framework, and our assessment of broader food and drink missions and the opportunities within them, here are our five top recommendations for UK supermarkets to grow beyond their current ceiling. Increase the focus on fresh Fresh is emotive. What's more, it creates a very strong link to the product itself. Clearly there is a strong health-led angle driving consumers desire to shop and eat fresh food. And they like solutions - adding part

Showcasing much of Waitrose's latest thinking, the Newbury store delivers an elevated and differentiated customer experience. Here is how it stands out. An enhanced overall positioning The store reopened following refurbishment in late 2025, unveiling a raft of new initiatives, designed to create a strong foodie destination. The store very much lives up to its billing as “The home of food lovers”. There’s a pride around this positioning, so much so that this messaging sits pr

Co-op's recently published State of the Mission report highlights the relative importance of different missions across its food retail business. Here we share some of our key takeaways from a broader convenience and food-to-go perspective. 1. Coop has identified 17 distinct shopper missions from its analysis of 1.57bn customer baskets It then splits these into seven higher level missions: top up, food-to-go, meal occasions, treat, newsagent, entertaining and gifti

There's a lot going on in Barcelona right now across both retail and food-to-go, and within different segments of the market. Fresh produce led concepts across retail and foodservice, next level supermarkets, differentiated empanada chains and enticing bakery-led concepts rank among the highlights - check out our top five recommendations below, and get in touch for deeper insights. 1. Ametller Origen, Mercat D’Autors A stellar concept, with an inspirational back story. Th

As summer launches hit, here is our take on the key trends we’re seeing in London right now. 1. Protein still leads, but fibre is showing signs of rising Protein remains in high demand and protein based messaging remains a key focal point across the market. In the UK, we’re still at a stage where the messaging is fairly simple – the amount of protein on dishes is the key way of communicating protein value. How could this evolve further? We’d probably be looking at

We're seeing a new wave of convenience store format under way in London. Here we highlight some of the broader focus areas within this as we look as to how the market could evolve. Making more of better food-to-go Whether it be Co-op's new micro retro counters, Sainsbury's new look and feel for its Local convenience formats or Whole Foods Market's new concept, unveiled last month in Angel, there's a lot under way here. The calibre and breadth of ranges has expanded rapidly

Los Angeles and California overall are rightly seen as beacons in terms of future trends around healthier eating and drinking and better for you solutions across grocery and broader wellness. And there's a huge amount to learn from concepts here, as we've discovered in visits over recent years. Here we've focused on our four top concepts to learn from based on our recent visits. Erewhon Some see Erewhon as a supermarket, others as a health supplements or healthier eat

We've recently spent time assessing the evolution of food-to-go across key channels in Australia, focusing this time on Sydney and Melbourne. A founding principle for us is that spending time understanding the dynamics of and operators in other markets helps inform and shape better propositions in your home market, and our visit to Australia delivered this in abundance, delivering a raft of learnings we see as relevant across Europe. While there were learnings across a broad

Ireland is a long-standing global reference market for food-to-go in retail and it is one that continues to evolve. Over many years we've witnessed and showcased the extent of the food-to-go focus across retailers, whether in city centre, neighbourhood or roadside locations. And groups we take to Ireland are constantly impressed by the level of development and the focus on the category. A variety of retailers have been able to make food-to-go an intrinsic part of their propo

Paris is a real hot bed of food-to-go development, with some fantastic operators and some great initiatives under way. Here are some of our key takeouts from our latest visit to the French capital: Bakery-led food-to-go remains standout It's no surprise, given the importance of the boulangerie in France, that this has been a springboard for many into the food-to-go sector. And with multiple operators in this space, there are some great things going on here. One of our refere

We recently spent some time in a very cold New York. We learned a lot around the future of food-to-go and retail and a lot about the benefits of precise route planning in sub zero temperatures. Here are a selection of our food-to-go and retail learnings: Erewhon style concepts are gaining a foothold Los Angeles chain Erewhon has gained a strong global reputation as a trendsetter - in many ways it's a lifestyle brand that sells food & drink products. There's much for many oper

Following several recent London safaris, we draw out some the key shifts under way across the food-to-go landscape. 1. The continuing growth of fresh focused, bowl led concepts Salad bars is easier to say. But for us, in its traditional, tight, British English definition, it's less accurate. It is however clear is that operators with quality, fresh ingredients, curated into bowls (and sometimes plates) are growing fast. There's been significant expansion over the pa

Earlier this month in London we held our first food-to-go insights & meet up session of the year. Now into its third year, this edition included Foodmaker Founder & CEO Lieven Vanlommel, as well as Gavin and Matt's latest perspectives on the market. An excellent guest list and some inspirational conversations around the room complemented the presentations, Here's our summary: Food-to-go has come a long way, but there's still a lot to go for There has been huge evolution acro

As we look at the prospects for the year ahead, here are our five key areas of focus: 1. An expanding “better for you” market A key way in which London's food-to-go landscape has evolved in the past year lies in the expansion of vegetable led specialists such as The Salad Project, atis, Urban Greens and Farmer Js. Quality, fresh, seasonality and variety underpin the amply filled bowls - or fieldtrays - that each of them serve. They’ve been expanding at pace over the pas

We recently visited the new SuperValu concept in the expanding Dublin commuter town of Hansfield. And it impressed. We met up with Gary McMahon, Musgrave’s Food Specialist, and explored how the 14,500 sq ft store is positioning itself as a forward-thinking food and drink destination. Here’s what we found: 1. Fresh at the Heart Fresh is the heartbeat of the store. Even before entering the store, floristry sets the tone. An impactful floristry selection by the entrance lea

There’s a lot going on in grocery retail in South Africa right now, and it feels that a lot of the recent development has been spearheaded by Shoprite. It operates several different formats across the market, but perhaps the standout from an innovation perspective is Checkers. Its new look Checkers format is now well-established, and in fact has recently been flexed to fit within a smaller, neighbourhood style format in addition to the core supermarket format. For us, what st

In our view, exploring the food-to-go landscape in Ireland should be a critical part of the development journey for anyone involved in...

Baked goods and food-to-go are natural partners, but this, in our view, is of increasing importance across the sector, and we see...