Mintel has announced three key predictions that highlight opportunities for food and drink brands to strengthen consumers’ resolve to endure adversity now and in the years ahead.
In 2030 and beyond, expect to see a newfound respect for resourcefulness, leading to cans, frozen food, and other long-life products taking the spotlight.
Meanwhile, health-focused consumers will use AI as they do with their digital music libraries to ‘shuffle’ their weekly diets to ensure they’re diverse.
At the same time, inclusive product development will stretch to senatorial innovations for the neurodivergent community. The Mintel 2026 Food and Drink Predictions are:
Retro Rejuvenation
For consumers in 2026, nostalgia for ‘the past’ does not mean rewinding to a specific year or era. Instead, they are seeking refuge from a volatile, artificially intelligent world in an idealised view of life in the past as simpler.
Amid the ‘polycrisis’ of recent years, consumers have gravitated to ancient medicines for stress relief, mindfulness and a pressure-free way to achieve fulfilment. This solace is primarily sought by Millennials ages 28-45 who are seeking a higher purpose in the ‘extended middle’ decades of life.
The shocks and disasters that consumers will have survived by 2030 will inspire them to prepare themselves and their pantries to endure whatever surprise is next. Brands that ground themselves in heritage ingredients will benefit from the trust consumers place in history.
By 2030, ancestral food practices like seasonal eating, fermentation and natural preservation will evolve from niche interests into mainstream strategies for resilience. Brands will revive techniques like pickling, drying and fermenting, not just as eco-conscious choices, but as culturally rooted solutions that reduce waste, extend shelf life and support gut health.
A newfound respect for resourcefulness will also develop and will inspire a fresh look at cans, pouches, freeze-dried, frozen and other long-life product formats. Retailers will invest in centre aisles that improve ‘dwell time’ and inspire discoveries of a new generation of versatile, innovative gourmet ambient brands, such as Bold Beans in the UK or Fishwife in the US.
“Maxxing” Out, Diversity In
At a time when there’s an abundance of instantly available health advice, protein and fibre are cutting through the clutter in 2026 and going mainstream as easy-to-understand, accessible and essential nutrients.
By 2030, consumers will shift away from rigid nutritional goals toward a more inclusive, diverse diet. The focus is moving from maximisation to balance, and from single-function ingredients to holistic, culturally rooted formulations.
Expect to see parents set their children up with the proper nutrients not only for ideal growth and development, but also for a healthy gut microbiome as well as precision nutrition boosts, such as customised combinations of seeds, herbs and spices, to help consumers amp up variety.
Just as they hit shuffle on their digital music libraries, health-focused consumers will use AI to ‘shuffle’ their weekly diets to ensure they are diverse, include a range of ingredients, and inspire excitement with new combinations.
AI will also encourage the trial of new foods with ‘if you like this, then you’ll like that’ recommendations for fruits, vegetables, grains, seeds, spices, or proteins that are new but familiar. Brands that innovate with nuance, cultural relevance and foresight will be better placed to meet the needs of consumers.”
Intentionally Sensory
Whether it’s ‘dirty sodas’ or Dubai chocolate, multi-sensory innovations have become synonymous with playfulness, novelty and viral sensations in recent years. In the future, brands will be more intentional in their use of colour, texture, or aroma to create food and drink that stimulate the senses and reinvigorate experiential eating and brand positioning.
Innovations that engage several senses will serve as antidotes to increasingly virtual, repetitive and isolated daily lives. By 2030, multi-sensory inspiration will also come from empathetic explorations of how to formulate products for the unique sensory needs of underserved consumer groups, including the elderly, neurodiverse individuals, and GLP-1 medication users, while enticing mainstream consumers.
Brands have an opportunity not just to reimagine traditional food and drink, but also to reimagine the consumption occasions where they can be applied, providing a whole new way to remain relevant to Generations Z and Alpha.
Opportunities will emerge for food and drink brands to use multi-sensory elements such as aroma, audio or video to modernise consumption occasions that were iconic for previous generations. For example, social occasions that would previously have lasted into the early hours of the next day will translate into morning DJ dance parties in cafes focused on coffee and tea.
Understanding the sensory expectations of consumers, from texture to aroma to emotional payoff, will be key to creating products that resonate.
More insights here
