Food and drink group Princes is looking to drive product innovation via a new co-creation initiative with retailers.
The ‘Co-Labs’ platform aims to help retailers tap into emerging trends, whilst utilising “cutting edge” technology and leveraging consumer insight to identify new products that will prove commercially successful.
Princes’ innovation arm, Innov8, was set up by the Liverpool-based company in 2019, creating a team that focuses on developing new branded and own-label products. Innov8 has been behind a number of innovative products launched by the food giant in recent years, including U:ME Spice Shots, Princes Fruit Pots, Princes Plant-Based Ready Meals and the Plot 9 Plant-Based Range.
Innov8 has worked with innovation consultancy KICR to embed the consumer viewpoint as part of the innovation process. The 3,000-strong consumer community, which has grown from a panel of 800 in 2019, will be used as part of the Co-Labs platform to provide product feedback, co-create concepts, deliver category understanding, and trial products. The firm highlighted that these insights can be drilled down to views on specific retailers and branded and own-label ranges, fuelling “ground-breaking co-creation projects”.
Princes’ £5m “state-of-the-art” Innovation Kitchen at its Royal Liver Building headquarters will also be used for the Co-Labs initiative to host product testing and demonstrations, as well as workshops.
Alan Eriksen, Marketing Director at Princes Group, said: “The last 18 months has seen the biggest shift in global, social and consumer trends in decades. And it doesn’t stop changing. We have absolute belief that our now 3,000-strong consumer community and our truly unique take on food and drink innovation is the blueprint for how retailers can keep pace.
“Co-Labs will see us partner with retailers to leverage our unique community to provide real-time insights into the categories that matter to them most, helping to create and refine future-fit innovation that meets their changing consumer needs head-on.”
