Functional dairy trends: better nutrition, broader gut health, customization

From white milk to yogurt to functional yogurt, Foodaily believes that Chinese dairy products are moving towards a new stage, and the outbreak of the epidemic also brings a very good window for the development of functional dairy products. At present, functional dairy products will become an important engine to promote the development of dairy products. I believe this has also become the consensus of the industry.
 
So from a global perspective, how is the development of functional dairy products? How do consumers view the functionality of dairy products? What is the trend of functional dairy products? What is the future development direction?
 
On July 30th, at the FBIC2020 Global Food and Beverage Innovation Conference held by Foodaily Daily Foods, Ipsos first published the "People-oriented, Dairy Functional Trend Insight Report", which was researched by Ipsos China's market strategy and consumer understanding service line Director Zhang Lu interpreted the trend of dairy functionalization from the perspective of consumers and from the perspective of "people".

 
Global trend: functional dairy products enter the fast lane
 
With the improvement of the quality of life, consumers in most countries or regions in the world have got rid of the survival needs of food and clothing. They are gradually paying more and more attention to the nutrition, health and hygiene aspects of food, and are looking forward to obtaining functional benefits from food. stand by. As a very important role in functional foods and beverages, dairy products are developing vigorously worldwide, especially in the Asian and North American markets.
 
For consumers in the Asian market, they have a natural demand for health care and health. Although the current per capita consumption of dairy products in China is still low, it also reminds us that China’s future functional dairy market will face huge development opportunities.
 
In particular, the new crown epidemic has accelerated the development of functional dairy products. According to consumer research reports during the Ipsos epidemic, compared with 2019, consumers’ recognition of dairy products for improving their health has risen from 39% to 49%. At the same time, half of consumers said they plan to spend on dairy products. More, this is a very positive signal for functional dairy products.

Although both the market environment and industry experts maintain a very optimistic attitude towards the development of dairy products, the level of consumer purchases is very different from the level recognized in the industry. Although the sales of some functional yogurts were boosted during the epidemic, overall, the sales share of functional dairy products in the market is still not high. So what causes this consumption phenomenon?
 
This requires us to transform our perspective and look at their expectations and requirements for functional dairy products from the perspective of consumers.

Functional dairy products are applauded and not priced,
What are consumers thinking?
 
Consumers’ perceptions of functional dairy products are distributed in the form of droplets
 
From an industry perspective, we often look at functional dairy products from the perspective of "what kind of effect is achieved", "what kind of functional ingredients are added", etc., but consumers are not.
 
Ipsos believes that consumers' awareness of functional dairy products needs a "drop-shaped distribution", which can be divided into three levels: relief/recovery, maintenance, and enhancement.

(1) Relief/recovery: return to normal health
 
First of all, regarding the "relief/recovery" of the long tail part of the water drop mode, this part focuses on a lot of topics related to functional dairy products, such as restoring vitality, assisting sleep, reducing fat and losing weight. Consumers believe that functional dairy products can help They returned from a negative physical state to a normal state.
 
Under this track, different segmentation functions have formed the "long tail effect" under the water drop mode. Disassembly will reveal that the market is very large, but too much segmentation will also make consumers aware Difficulty.
 
(2) Maintain: maintain current good health
 
From the perspective of consumers' emotional appeal and cognition, the level of "maintenance" is more acceptable. Consumers are also looking forward to keeping the body in a healthy and balanced state, and the functions of "more high-quality nutrients" and "more easily absorbed by the body" are covered in this range.
 
(3) Enhancement: achieve better health
 
Consumers' understanding of the concept of "enhancement" is that they can achieve the effect of strengthening while maintaining their original physical state after consuming dairy products.
 
On the whole, for the above three different levels, the main direction of the brand is still different from the consumer's perception, so it is extremely important to be able to understand the needs of consumers.
 
Ipsos adopts a differentiated consumer training method to allow the target population to summarize and sort dairy products in different categories and packaging forms, and classify them according to product functional differences and similarities, thereby obtaining survey data.
 
Consumers’ expectations for the functions of dairy products are highly relevant to the category
 
Judging from the survey results, consumers have a very clear positioning awareness of different types of dairy products. Among them, the supplement of high-quality nutrition, low-temperature fresh milk and normal-temperature white milk firmly occupy the cognition of consumers.

For probiotic fermented yogurt, in the eyes of consumers, it is often defined as the function of promoting intestinal digestion and absorption. It is worth noting that consumers often define dairy products as functional beverages with a "relief/recovery" effect. The more detailed functional areas are not very clear in consumers' perceptions, which also shows that more segmented functions require deeper brand implantation and consumer promotion.

3 future directions of functional dairy products
 
Regarding functional dairy products, what trends and methods are there in different categories and scenarios that deserve attention? Next, for the above-mentioned drop-shaped pattern, we analyze it in three levels.

 
"Better" nutrition
 
Why put nutrition on the topic of function? Nutrition is not functional in a certain sense, but in the minds of consumers, high-quality nutrition is the material basis for the product to function.
 
During the epidemic, 51% of consumers paid more attention to the nutritional value of products, ignoring marketing factors such as advertisements and endorsements of traffic stars in the process of brand promotion. In addition, up to 70% of consumers are more concerned about whether products can meet the nutritional requirements: 64% of consumers are more willing to buy dairy products with high-quality nutritional sources.
 
Ipsos research shows that "better" nutrition presents the following characteristics in terms of target population, scene demand, and category distribution:
 
In terms of target population, those who care about high-quality nutrition are usually families with children who care about quality of life and their families. For target groups with such labels, it is not enough to simply meet the needs of parents. On the contrary, product design should also take into account the needs of children in the family. In addition, the cooking of such users has changed from passive to active, so the raw materials will become more important points for them.
 
In terms of consumption scenes, high-quality nutrition is in demand in all scenes, especially in breakfast, hunger and stomach, and leisure enjoyment scenes.

In terms of categories, high-end white milk and low-temperature yogurt are of natural and pure quality, with high nutritional value, and can provide high-quality nutrition. They belong to the key categories in this direction. In this regard, products can be developed from the perspectives of quality, high-quality milk sources, advanced technology, higher nutritional content, and pure taste.

 
"Broad" gut health
 
Ipsos research shows that 64% of dairy consumers pay attention to the intestinal health function of dairy products. Different from other functional purposes, consumers have a high degree of awareness of the properties of yogurt produced by probiotic fermentation and regulating intestinal health. Therefore, maintaining or strengthening gastrointestinal health has become a unique label and attribute in the yogurt strain, and consumers are more willing to pay for it.
 
Intestinal health, as a unique functional attribute of dairy products, how to strengthen the function?
 
In terms of target population, understand the needs of consumers at different life stages for "gut health". For example, families with children pay more attention to promoting nutrient absorption, expressing love and care; young people pay more attention to intestinal smoothness and vitality; while women pay more attention to health management.
 
In terms of categories, low-temperature yogurt and lactic acid bacteria beverages are directly related to probiotics and fermentation, and are highly relevant categories for gastrointestinal health. In the future development direction, the intestinal health properties can be enhanced through the addition of special fermentation processes, probiotic strains and numbers, dietary fiber, herbs, etc.

 
"Customization" function
 
Ipsos research shows that consumers pay more attention to sleep, immune maintenance and gastrointestinal health issues. At the same time, dairy products have also participated in the areas of concern for diseases such as bones/joints, vision, weight/obesity, and skin.

From segmented functions to personal customization, it will become an important trend in functional dairy products.
 
The current dairy products may be popular, but in the near future, the dairy industry will be functionally subdivided, and even customized development through personal background information and medical monitoring to provide exclusive nutritional services.

Similarly, the customized research and development of dairy products still cannot deviate from the needs of consumers. Under the stress of intense work, young people have unhealthy eating habits and are prone to gastrointestinal discomfort. Therefore, they have more demand for dairy products that restore vitality, gastrointestinal health and relieve stress. Big.
 
Danone’s Oikos has launched a high-protein and caffeinated drinking yogurt, Oikos Pro Fuel, which is made from skimmed milk and is rich in nutrients such as protein, potassium and calcium, and added caffeine directly extracted from coffee beans. Effectively replenish energy and restore vitality.

For mature women, internal conditioning is as important as beauty management, so they pay more attention to functions such as weight loss and fat reduction, anti-aging, and supplementation of qi and blood.
 
For the silver-haired consumers entering the middle-aged and elderly life, their functions are weakened and they are beginning to face the three-high, aging and sleep problems. Therefore, if dairy products emphasize the effects of delaying aging, preventing the three-high and strengthening bones, they will be more willing to participate in the experiment. For example, a product launched by Uno in Canada uses Bifidobacterium lactis + Lactobacillus acidophilus to claim that it can reduce fasting blood sugar and glycosylated hemoglobin.

 
summary
 
The future trend of functional dairy products will focus on the three levels of better nutrition, extensive intestinal health, and customized functions.

For "better nutrition", we need to pursue the ultimate in satisfying consumers' basic functions of dairy products. For "extensive intestinal health", we need a more comprehensive consumer portrait, psychological and scene analysis, and a deep understanding of their needs. Finally, with regard to "customized functions", since the people involved in this aspect are relatively broad, we need to adopt a more systematic approach according to the different life stages of consumers to establish a strong link between ingredients and effects.