Webinar preview: Agrana Fruit spotlights texture with toolkit to enhance food experiences

Texture can significantly influence how we perceive taste, offering endless opportunities for culinary innovation. The appearance, aroma and mouthfeel of food all contribute to the overall enjoyment. This is the theme for the forthcoming webinar on November 26, where experts from Agrana Fruit will delve into why texture is a hot topic for innovation in the food and beverage industry.

The company will explore the latest texture trends and uncover what consumers are craving next during the webinar entitled “Enhancing food experiences with our texture toolkit.”

Manon Noe, global director, Portfolio Development & Innovation at Agrana Fruit and Melanie Sturm, global market & consumer insights manager at Agrana Fruit, will examine how and why texture plays a crucial role in how consumers experience food and beverages.

Why texture matters

Agrana Fruits experts in marketing, product development and innovation came together and partnered with the Life Institute to work on solutions for texture. Why is texture important? What are the latest trends? How can the company’s toolkit answer that?

“We all know that eating is a very sensory experience. It’s not just about the experience for the consumer, it’s also about really big opportunities for innovation. It plays a key role in how consumers experience food and beverages and it’s really about a multi-sensory experience; taste, and also seeing the product. All your senses are engaged in food products, that’s why it’s so important to look at food texture,” says Sturm.

“There were also 28 million conversations on social media in one year around texture, only for yogurt, ice cream and beverages. It’s a big consumer-driven topic.”

Taste is king, texture is queen

Strum adds that around 80% of consumers say that taste is important in making purchasing decisions. If the taste isn’t on-point then consumers will not repeat the purchase.

But what sometimes can be overlooked is the importance of texture, she says.

“Taste is king but texture is the queen and we need both of them. About 50% of consumers are influenced by texture in their food purchases. It’s really a critical topic.”

“With all of the research we have done, what we see are two opposing trends in texture. One direction is the joy in the experience, indulgence, so it’s about very thick, heavy, creamy, crunchy and crispy types of textures.”

“The second opposing direction, where there is more influence from health trends and affordability trends, is about light, airy, mouse kind of textures.”

Register here to find out more about texture trends, innovation and how Agrana Fruit can be a partner in texture innovation with a multi-faceted toolbox designed to enhance the texture experience of yogurts, ice cream, baked goods, beverages and more.