FROM INSPIRATION AND IDEAS TO THE MASS MARKET; LOOKING FOR THE NEXT POMEGRANATE, Emmanuel Laroche, Symrise and Donna Wydra, Socratic Technologies

While flavor companies have always been driven by technology, it was revealed today at the Shopper Insights conference that inspiration also plays a big role in developing flavors and driving innovation.

Symrise, working with Socratic Techologies, wanted to take a new approach in product development by positioning taste as a point of differentiation. They knew that, to be a success, a new product needed to resonnate with consumers, so they built a community of consumers with expertise in product and flavor development. But they chose to build this community online.

Because it existed online, their community of "foodies" could be international in scope. It consisted of people who were very loyal, dedicated, and passionate about food and flavors. The community consistently delivered a high response rate to questions posed, with high quality responses to large amounts of open-ended questions -- and in an extremely timely manner.

Case studies presented in the session by Laroche and Wydra revealed flavor preferences that this group of foodies had for new coffee beverages and alcoholic drinks targeted to millennial female consumers ('Fruit 'n Java' for the coffee, and strawberry and tropical flavors for the alcoholic beverages). And while folks have traditionally struggled with early stages of innovation, utilizing an online community takes the process away from marketing and puts it in the hands of consumers on a quantitiative as well as a qualitative basis.

Most importantly, it allows you to truly know what the customer wants.