Welcome to Food Week April 17. This week, tons of stuff on the supply side. Water issues, sure, but also price fixing, child labor, AI (the virus) (no, the actual virus), sustainability, cultivated meat and food waste issues. And of course a bunch more on the rest of the industry. Enjoy.
MACRO
The elusive ‘soft landing‘ of the economy may be within reach.
Still some trouble with regional banks but the sense is they will generally be okay.
After a year of falling prices for food commodities, weather has disrupted the rice supply and shortages are driving prices up. Declines in fruits and nuts exports concerning as well.
RETAIL AND CONSUMER
Skinny Pop continues it’s growth since acquistion by Hershey’s.
Regenerative agriculture has not yet resonated with the average consumer. But General Mills is betting it will.
Relatedly, matching sustainability and profits has proved elusive for supermarkets.
Bud Light suspends social media activities in the latest phaseof its Hamlet marketing strategy.
5 misused and misunderstood words in consumer product claims: Local, Intensive, Industrial, Grass-fed, Natural. What they really mean.
RESTAURANTS AND FOODSERVICE
Restaurant delivery was a bad job before. The tendency of people to shoot out their front doors moves it from unpleasant to life threatening.
I am not a big McDonald’s fan – personal taste – but I have always liked the Big Mac sauce. The company is now selling dippable cups of it. This will likely not help them in their low intensity war with their franchisees.
Most people still uncomfortable with using QR codes in restaurants. Part of this is the age of the phone being used, part the age of the user but I also see, as a heavy restaurant user, that the qulaity of the links and the user experience varies hugely.
Using non-fungible tokens (NFT) to create further restaurant exclusivity sounds like an idea.
Some evidence that calorie menu labelling leads to lower consumption and reducing cancers. Lowering calories generally can improve aging and slow cognitive decline.
A really bad way to tip servers but a good way to out yourself as kind of a jerk.
FOOD SUPPLY CHAIN
A series of articles about the building crisis over Colorado River water and its impact on agriculture.
We are entering spring and with it comes the threat of more Avian Influemza outbreaks. Here are the origins and some of the prospects for the future.
JBS catching heat from lawmakers over the employment of children in meat plants. And they paid a $25 million fine over price fixing.
There is now an open source compendium for creating cultivated meat.
Some people prepared for the ‘atmospheric rivers’ and benefitted.
A lot of awareness has been generated about waste and the over-production of food in the US. But it isn’t getting any better.
FOOD WEEK APRIL 17 LAGNIAPPE
Is there a serial killer preying on cows in Texas?
The history of lemonade is richer and more complicated than you might think. A complicated but interesting Brazilian recipe.
Learn more about fermenting foods at home.
An argument for using conventional stoves versus alternatives. But it is just on the energy side and it doesn’t take into consideration the health effects of gas exposure.
Tiramisu overnight oats sound delicious and are surprisingly healthy.