Innovation is not dead

The industry is moving faster than ever, answering consumer and business needs at a rapid pace, with logic, and doing so more efficiently and effectively through new and emerging technologies.

That’s how Mars Food & Nutrition global vice president of R&D, Karina Zimerfeld, might summarise her present view on the industry she’s worked in for over 25 years.

She took up her current position last spring, joining from Unilever, and has focused on innovation, science and technology throughout her career.

At Mars, Zimerfeld leads on R&D for the business’ food and nutrition arm. She oversees R&D innovation, quality & food safety, science & technology, and science & regulatory affairs.

Mars Food & Nutrition‘s new product development strategy

“We are a thriving segment of Mars, for over 2,000 associates and for some of the most beloved brands, enjoyed by consumers across 30 markets,” she says.

Like its competitors, Mars is guided by a mission statement or purpose. Its current hook is around providing “better food today for a better world tomorrow”, something Zimerfeld says often.

She’s confident in the strategy, knowing it is what consumers want, because “we have a much better understanding [of them] and we’ve been building a strong consumer-centric business,” she says.

“There are so many opportunities in food now, there’s no better time to be in food than now,” she believes.

Consumers’ current pain points are around time, specifically being able to prepare and eat healthier foods with less time. Though this is a regrown trend from before 2019 as, during the COVID-19 pandemic, it reversed when people had more time to prepare their meals.

“How do I eat better and in a way that is healthier and tastier, these are things driving how we address our opportunities in the food environment,” she says.

Though it’s not only about the benefits of food to them, consumers also seek products that don’t contribute to – or even help in reversing – environmental damage.

“They are more aware of environmental challenges, that’s also an opportunity for us to deliver on this need.”

However, Mars’ core strategy or mantra is the true driving force behind product development and innovation. The business is focused on delivering “tasty, healthy and convenient” foods that can be part of consumers’ everyday lives.

On this point, Zimerfeld speaks of her own experiences and perceptions, saying it’s important for her and other consumers to have cupboard staples available at short notice that can not only be prepared and served within minutes, but that are healthy too.

“We know consumers are juggling a lot and that’s driving their need for convenience.”

She points to some research commissioned to support and guide Mars’ R&D, which showed 48% of consumers in the States spend less than 15 minutes preparing their meals. Some 77% prepared meals last-minute or with very little notice.

“But consumers are more health conscious now than ever,” she explains. “So they want to eat better and healthier, with 50% of consumers declaring they’re striving to make better choices in terms of eating better and healthier.”

While they’re expecting high levels of convenience and health, the basics of NPD continue to apply.

“The way you frame products and solutions to consumers are different,“ she explains. ”Consumers aren’t willing to compromise on the taste, in fact, two-thirds globally are curious about new flavours and experiencing new things.

“Experimenting with the world through flavours and different cuisines are embedding into the areas where we’re operating, along with the quest for foods that are healthier but don’t compromise on taste.”

How does Mars Food & Nutrition work with suppliers?

Though this is currently a bit of a dichotomy, she says, adding people are now – mostly due to a more negative environment, driven by the cost-of-living and global unrest – looking for familiar flavours and seeking to return to the comforts of their pasts.

So how does Zimerfeld and Mars innovate with so many moving metrics to hit? The business uses many processes, one of which includes working closely with suppliers, including ingredients suppliers, to deliver solutions .

“Suppliers are extremely important. Not only because Mars is striving to address certain consumer pain points, but because we need to do it by tapping into very different and new ingredients,” she says.

There’s now a higher level of collaboration between Mars and its suppliers, something that has grown in prominence recently. “We collaborate with elements of the value chain in food with partners who have different knowledge areas to build better solutions.”

It’s more necessary to do this now because the “world has changed and the pace in which innovation lands in the market is very different”, she explains. In the past, innovation could take years to get on shelf, but trends are now moving so quickly – often due to factors like social media – that it’s essential to do everything possible to move with speed.

“What we’ve seen is the pace of change, which would have taken years. We want to do that in a much faster, because trends are emerging and pivoting quickly. You need to collaborate to embrace quicker change.”

But is there such a thing as ‘new’ innovation? Some critics would argue there’s nothing new on the market, just iterations of various products. However, Zimerfeld passionately disagrees with this notion.

“I do think things are new,“ she argues. ”Probably, it’s the pace that makes us feel, sometimes [that things aren’t new]. We see a lot of things coming and we might not perceive how innovative and disruptive they are in the market.”

She cites products like Ben’s Original Street Food – ambient pre-prepared, microwave rice and vegetable dishes – or Ben’s Original Protein bowls, another ambient product, as examples.

“These innovations borrow from what people eat and how we eat, but the innovation is how we pack the grains and vegetables into them,” Zimerfeld explains.

“Bringing things like lentils, chickpeas and barley into a product that I can have served in less than two minutes is innovation. Having them shelf-ready and in the cupboard so they can be served last-minute is innovation.”

Mars Foods’ AI and technology strategy

Some of the ingredients used in these products take hours of preparation if the dishes were being scratch-prepared. “Having all that, ready to eat in your hands is an incredible innovation.”

And of course, new and emerging technologies, such as AI, are changing the way Zimerfeld and her team are developing innovation. It is mostly a time saver, eliminating the need for teams to talk to and observe hundreds of consumers in homes or visit hundreds of restaurants around the world – though Zimerfeld says it is still important to be on the ground doing these things.

“But what the digital tools are doing is taking multiple data from multiple sources and driving insights and improvements. We talk about early consumer feedback and when we’re creating a new product, we’re capturing insight along the journey and adapting and evolving the product.”

Doing that with AI allows Mars to get more out of the data and feedback and at a much faster rate. “It creates magic, because it’s delivering something that wouldn’t have been good or as fast without those technologies.”

Some of the business’s recent innovations, she admits, wouldn’t have occurred without AI and other technologies being adopted by Mars. There’s also been a direct sales response from the AI-influenced R&D.

“What we’ve seen since the launch of our ready meals portfolio across the world is a traction and compared with past innovations, it’s a serious success.”

Its recent innovations success will guide Zimerfeld and Mars‘ future focus. They’ve only scratched the surface of learnings from the “significant amount of time and brains” dedicated to understanding what consumers want.

Boldly, Zimerfeld concludes: “We believe we’ve decoded that and the recent launches of ready meals have been successful.

“We’ll continue to expand those portfolios and enter new areas in ready meals and flavours all with the ambition to ensure we’re convenient, tasty and healthy.”