Having worked at a food-tech company for eight months now, I have learned an enormous amount about how the food and beverage industry operates and all the extremely rigid norms companies have to follow to get a product on-shelf in retail. Most of it I have found quite fascinating, and some I've really grown to appreciate. But there is one element that I just cannot wrap my head around no matter how hard I try: the way in which retailers and therefore sales folks use the word "innovation."
To me, a word like "innovation" should be used exclusively for things that actually restitch the fabric of how an industry, category, or product exists today. The iPhone is innovation. Venmo is innovation. Robinhood is innovation. The air fryer is innovation. Innovation is creating something so unique and clever that it changes the way everyone views a category or product and often sets a new standard for every other company to be compared against. It doesn't have to be iPhone-level big, but it has to be, well, genuinely innovative.
In the world of retail sales, "innovation" pretty much just means any change. Any update you make is considered "innovation" if it adds value to the consumer. New flavor of Ruffles? Innovation. Larger bottle size of Heinz ketchup? Innovation. New shape of animal cracker? Innovation.
This practice feels like Nestlé putting up a massive marquee at their headquarters saying, "WE ARE OUT OF IDEAS." Calling everything "innovation" is a complete validation of what most food-tech companies say about the food and beverage industry: on the product side, it's a complete wasteland for creativity. The industry landscape is defined by five major companies that have kept a steady market share for the past four decades and will continue keeping a steady market share for the next four, therefore they don't have any major incentive to explore novel ideas. They just maintain the status quo, leading us to this dark place where miniature M&Ms feel genuinely revolutionary.
All I'm saying is I'm happy to be working at a company in this industry where when we say "innovation," we mean it. We don't mean a new color of Starburst. We mean genuinely industry-shifting products, and that's cool.
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