Speaker Q&A: Gavin Rothwell, IGD
Our next speaker Q&A features Gavin Rothwell, head of food-to-go and retail safaris / senior retail insights manager at IGD. He’ll be sharing data from across IGD’s global insights programme, highlighting some of the latest and ‘best examples’ of great food-to-go innovations and trends.
What do you see as key trends for food-to-go in the next few years?
Firstly, I’d say food-to-go is a fascinating market to be involved with right now, full of opportunity but also one where the pace of development feels like it’s faster than ever. Understanding the latest trends and staying up to speed with them is therefore key.
And there’s lots to keep on top of. I’ll be repeating what many others say when I talk about plant-based, health, and sustainability being significant areas of focus now and going forward. But there’s so much going on beyond this.
For example, we’re seeing a lot of activity around different locations. We’d expect this flexibility in locations will continue to grow – there are some great expansion opportunities out there where there’s a ready made group of hungry and thirsty customers, whether it be in workplaces, travel locations or in a wide range of retail and leisure outlets. And linked to this, expect more new and different partnerships to emerge – I’ll take a look in my session at some of the activity we’ve seen to date here and what we can learn from other markets.
Another consideration has to be the increasing competition we’re seeing, as existing players expand and more new players look to target the market, whether based on success in food-to-go in another market, or in a related field, not least as we see more restaurant operators targeting the food-to-go space. And, at the same time, retailers across the board are increasingly recognising the opportunity, flexing and developing their approach to take advantage. The bar continues to rise in food-to-go, so growth is perhaps harder fought for now than previously. All of this creates an intriguing trading environment in food-to-go right now and a fascinating future.
What will you be sharing at this year’s lunch!.
Our focus will be on, and around, some of the latest innovations and trends we’re seeing in the food-to-go market globally, calling on some of the latest, best examples of great food-to-go execution and development that we’re seeing globally across food-to-go specialists and retailers alike, against a backdrop of our food-to-go trends framework.
Which café / coffee shop / food-to-go operators do you particularly admire and why?
There are so many great concepts out there, and new ones are emerging all the time, which is testimony to the growth opportunity in food-to-go right now. So it’s hard to narrow it down to a single operator. But perhaps the one that’s had the biggest impact on me over the past couple of months was Dr Smood, a small New York based chain that takes the health angle to new heights. It’s still an inclusive rather than exclusive format, but one that helps customers navigate by the particular health mission they are on. Dr Smood is one of the operators I’ll be talking about in more detail at lunch!.
What do you think is the key for operators to successfully compete against their competitors?
We track the development of a lot of businesses across the food-to-go sector. Building a successful, differentiated concept is a massive achievement in itself. Scaling it up, at the right pace for the business, can be even harder. Avoiding the temptation to expand too quickly can therefore often be the key to longer term success.
How important is lunch! to the food-to-go sector?
It’s a must-attend event every year for those looking to grow in food-to-go, and a fantastic opportunity to catch up with friends and contacts, old and new.
See Gavin at lunch! 2019
Food-To-Go: The Global Perspective – What Global Innovators Tell Us About Future UK Growth Opportunities: 11.45am on Thursday 19 September in Keynote Theatre 3
