Is ‘newness’ important to Gen Z in food and drink products?

Brands frequently hear that they need to be continually innovating if they want to stay relevant to a Gen Z audience. Younger people are often looking for the latest trend – but how true is this when it comes to food and drink? Do they need their food to be fashionable? Do they want the contents of their shopping cart to make a statement?

We surveyed 1,000 Gen Zers using Attest’s platform to provide relevant insights on these trends. We aimed to explore Gen Z’s interest in new food and drink products, the reasons they’re attracted to them, and what’s at the heart of their preferences. Read our findings below or dig into the data for yourself.

Key takeaways

1. It’s Gen Z’s natural curiosity that makes them far more likely to explore new food and drink products.
2. Newness is valued more in some categories than others: nearly half (49%) of Gen Z are very likely to try innovations in sweet treats and fast food.
3. Newness matters, but price does, too. More than half (52.9%) say price is their top consideration when deciding whether to buy a new food or drink product.

Gen Z’s interest in food and drink innovations

First, let’s tackle the big questions: what is newness exactly, and how interested are Gen Z in new food and drink products? Newness can mean a variety of things, including new flavors, new flavor combinations (like Dubai chocolate), or new formats (think: ready-to-drink beverages).

Next, to understand how interested Gen Z is in new food and drink products, we asked them how likely they would be to try a new innovation across seven different categories.

In every category, the respondents were far more likely to say they would try something new than not. This is true for both the U.S. and the UK. This indicates a strong overall interest in new food and drink products, however, there was some notable variation in interest across the categories. Not all F&B innovations are created equal.

Sweet treats have the most pulling power: 47.9% of American Gen Z and 50.1% of British Gen Z say they are very likely to be tempted by something sugary.

Here’s how the rest of the categories shaped up (percentage of respondents very likely to try):

We see some consistency between the U.S. and UK, but also some differences: Americans rank savoury snacks as #2 (44.2%) and fast food as #3 (41.5%). Meanwhile, British Gen Zers flip-flop those rankings (44% said fast food and 40.7% said savoury snacks). However, both groups agree that plant-based foods/milks rank the lowest (~16%).

This is why we run research: to explore, uncover and learn, then figure out where to look and what to do next.

Also within those results, it’s interesting to note that Gen Z are not that adventurous when it comes to alcoholic drinks, but that’s probably down to the fact that young people are less likely to be drinkers than their older counterparts. This would also explain their higher interest in soft drink innovations.

Why is newness so attractive to Gen Z?

We wondered what drives a young person to want to try new food and drink products – is it an internal drive (for them) or external (for how they seem to others)? Or are they actually trying to use their purchasing power to change the status quo or conflate category trends with other motivations and needs, for example by buying products that are more environmentally friendly?

So, we researched that, too. According to our respondents, the answer is that they simply want to discover something they might like; 76% of Americans and 73.9% of Brits say this. Young people are open to new experiences and apparently have a natural curiosity – this doesn’t necessarily mean they’re fickle and won’t stick with something they like, but it does mean they’re a good audience for brands to target with new innovations.

Only 3% of Americans and 4.6% of Brits admit that the main reason they would try a new food or drink product is to fit in with or impress their peers. This could be higher in reality, but peer pressure simply isn’t stated as a major motivator.

Other reasons to try a new product include to improve their diet or wellbeing (U.S.: 15.8%, UK: 16.9%), suggesting that health claims and packaging/promotions that promote health-related messages could help generate interest among this age group. Meanwhile, we see less interest in buying new products to drive environmental or social change; only 4.2% (U.S.) and 3.8% (UK) buy for this reason.

Novelty is not the be all and end all

Newness might be attractive, but just how important is it when Gen Z are making purchasing decisions? Does it outweigh other factors? We asked respondents to rank the importance of five factors when considering whether to buy a food or drink product.

US results:

It should come as no surprise that price came out as most important (by some margin) in both markets. The Gen Z demographic are not going to overpay for the sake of novelty, particularly in the current economic environment.

In fact, innovativeness/uniqueness (the original subject and hypothesis for this Attest Investigates) was deemed only the third most important factor in both countries.

UK results:

On the other hand, perceived quality was ranked second in both countries, suggesting that rebranding existing products could have more profitability than bringing new ones to market.

Intent is high, but so is inflation

Gen Z, as we’ve seen, have a high openness to new food and drink products. If they see a new product on the supermarket shelves, they’re likely to want to try it, but the realities of the economy are that they might not be able to afford to. 

In our recently released U.S. and UK Food & Beverage reports, we found that many shoppers are sticking to a tight budget when they go food shopping. Right now, trying something new is a risk that cash-strapped consumers are probably less likely to want to take. This data certainly seems to back that up: 80.7% of U.S. Gen Z and 81.5% of UK Gen Z say that the rising cost of living is having a medium to big impact on their likelihood to try new food and drink products.

Conclusion

Our data is clear: while Gen Z is open to trying new food and drink products, the fact that something is new is not the most important factor. 

It’s fair to say that newness could actually be a bad thing in the current economic climate, unless you can undercut (or at least match) incumbent products on price. This is something brands should certainly bear in mind, perhaps delaying plans to develop and launch new products until the economy is on firmer footing. Revamping existing products might be a more lucrative near-term option. 

Either way, don’t rely on guesswork. Attest supports brands like yours with access to insights from over 150+ million consumers across 59 countries – giving you a competitive advantage by uncovering what resonates with Gen Z consumers, identifying areas for improvement, and guiding which ideas are most likely to succeed in the market.