Personalisation is changing the face of the food and drink industry and it is a great way to help you stand out from the competition by offering an experience that feels tailored and personal. 50% of people expressed interest in purchasing customised products or services, suggesting that personalisation is a way of tempting customers to eat at your outlet¹. Not only does this encourage more customers to come into your sites, but it also encourages those who do come in to pay more, with 1 in 4 willing to pay more to receive a personalised product or service².

 

Health personalisation

Consumers are increasingly looking for healthier products and for it to be clearer and easier for them to access. It is important that what you’re providing can be optimised for specific health benefits or nutritional requirements. By offering personalisation, consumers can choose different options to meet their specialist diets or any health goals they may have. Special diets such as veganism and plant-based diets have grown hugely in recent years, with veganism growing an impressive 360% in Great Britain over the last decade³ so make sure you highlight this in your labelling.

By offering these personalised choices, you are more likely to meet your customers’ needs and consequently it will make it a more appealing place for them to eat. This also applies to consumers with allergies, as they can choose the options that do not contain the relevant allergens. To cater for people with these specialist diets, why not try offering the chance for them to personalise their meal with gluten free pastas or meat alternatives that can be swapped in?

 

Emotional connection

Personalisation can also come through the form of customisation, for example; packaging with names or messages. Customisation like this is a great way of getting customers involved with the process and they’ll feel more connected to the food/drink, creating an emotional response. Doing this is a good way to get customers involved and can lead to higher engagement rates whilst also encouraging repeat purchases.

Simple things like remembering regular customer’s orders is another great way of creating an emotional response, as this creates a personable relationship and shows that you care about their custom and want to make their lives that little bit easier.

 

Meeting preferences

By giving consumers exactly what they want it allows them to meet their personal need with more accuracy, so they are less likely to go elsewhere. This can be through offering different flavours, ingredients, textures, or offering eat-in and take-away options. Due to the fact that 26% of people consider themselves something as extreme as a picky eater, variety is key to keep an array of different customers happy⁴. Variation of food is also key for regular customers who don’t want to eat the same things every day. By allowing customers to choose different options each day, it means they won’t be as incentivised to go elsewhere for differentiation.

With more information available on what we should and shouldn’t eat than ever before, consumers want to manage what they eat. By providing the option for them to control the food they consume, they can choose more precisely what they want to eat. This personalised experience allows customers to choose exactly what they want, and therefore this will increase customer satisfaction.

 

Overwhelming choice

For personalisation the choices are endless, so you need to make sure that you don’t make things too complicated for your customer and lose their custom. To meet the needs of your customers it is essential to make the process as clear and straight forward as possible, to avoid any of this potential frustration or confusion. To combat this, we recommend you try categorising choices, suggest combinations or have default options that may help make the decision making process clearer and easier.

---

¹ Deloitte, 2015

² Deloitte, 2015

³ The Vegan Society, 2016

⁴ Statista, 2018