Trend Spotting at Expo East

Natural Products Expo last week in Boston was a fun experience. It’s always inspiring to see the innovative new products and how companies are talking about them. There were some 1,500 exhibitors across personal care, food, pet food, home care and vitamins. Folks manning the booths seemed pleased with the volume of traffic and the intent of the buyers.

After eating and drinking my way through another experiential overload, I’m sharing a few personal observations. Gluten-free was strongly represented, and from speaking with the purveyors, it is definitely a “here-to-stay” trend, not a “quick-hit-and-run” fad. Most importantly, taste, texture and appeal are way up over the gluten-free offerings of even the recent past. Coconut as an ingredient … coconut milk drinks, coconut oil in personal care products, coconut candies … is big. Soy went missing this year. Weight management seemed less reliant on low-fat/low-carb appeal than portion size, with lots of pre-packed 100-calorie organic offerings. There were still a lot of bottled enhanced drinks, but also a sizable representation of small packages of single-serving energy and vitamin boosts to add to your own water.

Once consumers “get” something, producers comply. Witness the popularity of probiotics, antioxidants and omegas—ingredients that enjoy relatively strong consumer acceptance and, hence, seem to be added to just about everything. Another example of consumer power is in the area of animal welfare. I was happy to make the acquaintance of American Humane, a group out of Denver with a certification program that establishes standards—and monitors compliance—for producers. They report interest and requests for certification are way up.

Finally, one of my mantras for food and food ingredients is sustainability. I was pleased to see a lot of action on the part of companies that have developed criteria along these lines for their business practices and ingredients sourcing.