Tastes Differ in a Global Industry

With strategically located regional development centers, BENEO focuses on customer proximity and ensures that new product ideas convince with taste and market relevance

Buzzwords like “glocalization” and phrases like “think globally, act locally” are omnipresent. Indeed, one of the most widely asked questions of our time is: How can regional identities and cultural characteristics be preserved in a globalized world? In answering this, the food industry faces the challenge of combining global business activities with the right feel for differing regional needs and customs. To master this challenge, BENEO focuses on regional product development. At multiple sites around the world, food technologists work together with customers and partners on tailormade concepts in the style of the region that meet the tastes of local consumers.

TASTE – A VARIABLE WITH MANY FACETS

People’s taste preferences are being developed during the course of their lifetime and are directly related to their personal environment. There are some universal genetic predispositions in babies, such as a preference for sweet and an aversion to sour and bitter flavors. But it is only when infants start eating adult foods that they develop their own particular preferences in terms of the taste, texture and appearance of food. Social, cultural and psychological influences in particular determine what, when and how food is eaten later in life. It is difficult to change this imprint retrospectively. Maggots as a source of protein, chicken’s feet or fermented herring? To the palate of the average Brit, for example, these dishes do not appeal.