It’s apparent at deli counters and restaurants all over: Caribbean cuisine is gaining traction with consumers. The National Restaurant Association recently identified Caribbean food as one of its top trends to watch in 2022. AF&Co/Carbonate …
Just 2% of restaurants reported an increase in sales in December. Yet, a survey by TD Bank found 81% of restaurant operators are nevertheless optimistic about the future. Restaurant operators are faced with several challenges …
Ghost-kitchen startup Reef Technology is temporarily closing about one-third of its food trailers, reported Business Insider. (Jan 13) This activity comes on the heels of numerous operational challenges the delivery-only kitchen business has faced in recent …
Editor’s note: The Food Institute has a new Plant-Based Insider newsletter, coming in February! To sign up, click here. Plant-based chicken is taking center stage in 2022. KFC is the latest chain to introduce a …
More quick service restaurants (QSRs) are rolling out subscription services in the new year to leverage the pandemic pivot towards mobile ordering and remain top of mind with consumers. Throughout the month of January, Sweetgreen …
The so-called Great Resignation is only picking up speed, it seems. LinkedIn data show millions of baby boomers are retiring early, and millions of Gen Z workers in their 20s are quitting and re-evaluating life …
The leisure and hospitality industries posted solid job growth in December, but it remains to be seen how the fourth wave of COVID-19 will affect consumer demand and labor force participation. BLS Report Muted Compared …
Demand for allergy free foods continues to rise as consumers encounter a broader variety of motivations to steer clear of certain ingredients.
The U.S. reported a single-day record of COVID cases with more than one million new infections as the Omicron variant spreads across the country. The total may be partly due to delayed reporting from over …
The omicron coronavirus variant is causing headaches for American businesses. With the daily COVID case count surging above the half-million mark in the U.S., governments and businesses are imposing vaccine requirements on both employees and …
Get ready to hear the term “TikTok Kitchen” early and relatively often in 2022. The video-sharing social media platform – which has more than 1 billion monthly users – recently announced a partnership with Virtual …
Here’s an eye-opener: even as the pandemic continues, breakfast visits to restaurants have increased significantly. In the three months ending in November, online and physical visits to restaurants for breakfast increased 11% year over year, …
Plant-based offerings continue to expand across restaurant menus, as major players like Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat broaden their partnerships with fast-food chains. McDonald’s recently announced plans for a major U.S. expansion of its plant-based …
Multiple Starbucks locations have examined unionizing of late, which begs the question: Is this a harbinger of things to come in the fast-food industry? Fast-food workers have pushed for a $15 minimum wage, and the …
Ride-hailing service Lyft is entering the food-delivery space in a partnership with online-ordering platform Olo. Though it may sound like Lyft is trying to become the next Uber Eats, it’s setting itself apart with a …
New rules on animal welfare are slated to take effect Jan. 1 in California, but a coalition of restaurants and grocery stores have filed suit to block implementation for more than two years, arguing they …
Since the outset of the pandemic, foodservice delivery companies have become a staple of many American consumers’ habits. While they offered a lifeline to hungry consumers earlier in the pandemic during forced closures, many of …
As another challenging year for the restaurant industry winds down, operators continue to push back on the permeating impacts of COVID-19. All the while, innovative prospects glimmer on the horizon. Reduced Menus Increased food costs …
As another year comes to a close, Google revealed its annual list of top trending food searches. Here’s what consumers were looking for in 2021: TikTok pasta Bacon jam Birria tacos Crockpot chicken Hamantaschen Squid …
Propelled by the pandemic, robotic innovations are still making food-industry headlines. A few of the latest developments include: 7-Eleven partnered with Nuro to pilot a commercial delivery service using autonomous vehicles in the Silicon Valley …
Menu innovations are a key part of Shake Shack’s strategy, as CEO Randy Garutti noted in the chain’s latest earnings call. Though it has become well-known for its ShackBurgers, crinkle-cut fries and milkshakes, the chain …
Third-party delivery services like Instacart, UberEats and DoorDash have taken the world of grocery, retail and restaurants by storm. So, what’s the next great innovation for these segments? It could be autonomous delivery, using vehicles …
The lingering effects of COVID-19, inflationary pressures, and a desire among consumers for new types of cuisines will impact the chain restaurant space for years to come. That’s according to The NPD Group’s Stephanie Epperson, …
Pizza sales skyrocketed during the pandemic. Major chains saw a combined 6% uptick to $27.5 billion in 2020, according to an industry report from Technomic. And while boom may have leveled off in recent months, …
New research on consumers who use food-delivery companies like UberEats, GrubHub and DoorDash indicates that today’s food-delivery customers tend to be young and wealthy. Virtual brand company Nextbite’s white paper revealed that 71% of survey …
New research shows reason for optimism in the fine-dining space. Merchant Centric, which monitors customer reviews, recently noted that, during the first half of 2021, fine dining had the strongest guest sentiment and star rating …
The labor shortage continues to take a toll on restaurants across the U.S., just as the holiday season gets underway. For example, a California Boston Market shut on Thanksgiving after staff did not show up, …
Online and physical restaurant visits during lunch rose 4% in the year ending September 2021 compared to a year ago when visits were down 11%, based on The NPD Group’s U.S. foodservice industry tracking. “Consumers are …
Chip City launched just four years ago, under less-than-ideal circumstances. The cookie-and-coffee chain’s CEO, Peter Phillips, had a background in construction and was largely unfamiliar with the food industry. The company started with a mere …
While some might shy away from investing in restaurants right now, Dan Rowe is doubling down. The way he sees it, even during a lingering pandemic, people still wake up hungry every day, so certain …
What Vijay Kodali envisioned for years has finally become a reality. “We figure that, if we open our own restaurant and launch it, and make it operational, it’ll be a great story for us to …
The sandwich market’s potential appears to be underscored by recent quick-service restaurant acquisitions. In the span of two weeks, a pair of QSR parent companies expanded their culinary offerings via acquisitions of established brands. Restaurant …
Chicago residents in need of last-minute ingredients are in luck. Getir, the Turkish provider of ultrafast, 10-minute grocery delivery, started operations in the Windy City this week. The company, which was founded in Istanbul in …
A new survey signals that marijuana is competing with alcohol for Gen Z’s dollars. Technomic’s recent Adult Beverage Planning Program report shows that, in states where recreational cannabis is legal, nearly two-thirds (65%) of Gen …
By most accounts, post-pandemic life will involve lots of online shopping for consumers. Coronavirus lockdowns nudged most consumers in that direction, and innovation is pushing them further toward adoption of extensive online shopping for purchases …
During CPG Growth Strategies in an Inflationary 2022 – a recent webinar presented by IRI and RBC Capital Markets – experts noted what to expect in the months ahead regarding food prices, the labor pool, …
