Listen to consumers for cues on your food and beverage product development.

For food and beverage marketers, there are nuggets of new product inspiration to be found in listening to consumers. The proliferation of social media provides food and beverage marketers with a rich source of data about consumer engagement with specific brands and products, as well as consumer behavior within product categories. Consumers often tell marketers what they want in terms of food and beverage products through their conversations with each other in social media channels.

A recent case in point is low-caf coffee. Most coffee drinkers would agree that decaf coffee lacks a depth of flavor as well as the “lift” that comes from caffeine. However, many coffee drinkers have been advised by their physicians to cut back or eliminate caffeine altogether. What’s a coffee lover to do? The solution for the “cut back” crowd has been to make their own blend of decaf-caffeinated coffee at home to retain the characteristics of their favorite brew while still being able to look their physician in the eye and claim they have cut back on caffeine.

Deep Cello Roasting, personal coffee roaster, was listening to their consumers as well as coffee consumers in general, and decided that they could probably produce a better tasting low-caf coffee than consumers could in their own kitchens by carefully selecting and blending both caffeinated and decaf coffees. That’s how Speedbump low-caf coffee was born. The burning question is why did it take more than 200 years of coffee consumption for someone to latch onto this as a product concept?

It will be very interesting to listen to the social buzz as the low-caf coffee concept hits the Twitter-sphere and conversations blossom. Deep Cello Roasting has the benefit of being among the pioneers, but other coffee producers have the benefit of following the lead as the product category pioneers invest in educating consumers on the benefits of low-caf coffee and building consumer demand.

Either way, paying attention to what consumers say and do through social media, and other data sources, can yield some promising product opportunities for food and beverage marketers. The key is engagement with consumers through email, social, and “traditional” media channels, and effectively using these channels to stimulate consumer conversation. Then start really listening to what is being said about your product and product category in general.