Campden BRI Opens Dedicated Consumer Test Center
25 Nov 2015 --- Campden BRI has opened a new dedicated, state-of-the-art consumer test centre in Leamington Spa, England. The centre will support innovation and insights into new product development and provide quantitative and qualitative consumer research on food and drink products. This will include concept development, prototype assessment and final product evaluation, including product benchmarking.
Peter Burgess, Head of Consumer and Sensory Sciences at Campden BRI, told FoodIngredientsFirst: “We’ve experienced a continued growth in demand from businesses across food chain that are looking to include consumer input into various stages of the product development process. These stages include the identification of consumer needs through to concept development, prototype evaluation, product positioning and post launch evaluation. This demand has exceeded the capacity of our existing centres so extending our facilities by opening a new centre will enable us to meet current and future client requirements.”
In terms of the requirements of food processors, Burgess said: “Generally there is a growing focus on a structured approach to NPD in order to optimise appeal and the chances of success in crowded and competitive market place. Reliable insight into what consumers want from products – derived from a rigorous, structured approach - is essential for this. This structured approach is all the more critical given the squeeze on product launch timelines and resources available for product development. As a consequence, some of the question areas we are regularly asked to help with include defining what consumer problem(s) the product is trying to solve, identifying what target consumer segment(s) the product is most relevant for, understanding what the compelling and credible features of the product are, and critically how much will people pay for the product. As part of the product development process, a relatively modest upfront investment in research that addresses these question areas can pay great dividends. It can help ensure that limited resources are focused on products with the most potential – helping to maximise return on investment.”
He continued: “Opening this new regional test centre demonstrates our commitment to further enhancing our consumer and sensory science offering. We work with some of the world’s biggest brands and retailers in the food and drink industry, and this new regional centre provides us with a world-class facility offering even greater capacity and flexibility to ensure that we can meet their needs both now and in the future.”
The new facility complements the company’s leading edge sensory and consumer facilities at its headquarters in Gloucestershire and at the site of its brewing division in Nutfield, Surrey.
