As anyone who’s done segmentation studies knows, not all shoppers or consumers are the same.
Marketeers love to cluster shoppers into groups based on demographics, lifestyle, shopping habits and of course spend. It’s a fundamental part of segmentation (and I have done a fair few of these studies!)
The rise of apps like Yuka, Fooducate and Toxfox signal the growth of a heavily involved, nutritionally aware and possibly cynical cluster: shoppers who doubt what’s written on labels; or more accurately what isn’t on the labels.
Yuka was launched in 2017 and now has around 10m users. The App’s raison d’être is to score a product’s health. Food analyses are based on nutritional quality, presence of additives and whether they are organic.
Fooducate hails from Silicon Valley and has been around since 2009, whilst Tox Fox was pioneered by German NPO Friends of the Earth.
Whilst it would be misleading to claim these apps are mainstream, they clearly resonate with an educated, nutritionally aware and probably high spending demographic. Watch this space!
I have sat in many focus group studies round the world and just because many struggle to elucidate concepts like ‘protein’ or an ingredient label, it doesn’t mean they don’t care.