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An Award-Winning Approach
Onvo Receives Foodservice Launch Award
Cstore Decisions recognized the Onvo brand for the exceptional rollout of their Food on the Fly proprietary food and beverage offer in 2024. Food Forward Thinking is proud to have partnered with Onvo to develop and launch this outstanding program.
Curby's Named Innovator to Watch
Convenience Store News awarded Curby's with the 2022 Innovator to Watch Food Service Award. The opportunity to design a menu recognized for quality and innovation is especially significant for Food Forward Thinking.
Forward-Thinking Menu Design
How We Work Together
Food Forward Thinking acts as the Food Innovation, Menu and Product Development, and Category Management arm of convenience store chains, groceries, and restaurants. We research your data, your competitive set, and trends impacting your offers. We develop menus, select equipment, improve margins and cost of goods, and provide tools for real-world operations. Food Forward Thinking develops and optimizes foodservice platforms and elevates executional consistency.
Your Food Innovation Partner
We work with food and beverage producers, distributors, equipment manufacturers, and a broad range of foodservice operators to dial in recipe cost models, source ingredients, and develop training for proprietary food and beverage items. We partner across categories for operational wins.
A Fresh Approach to Food & Drinks
We understand consumer behavior, large-scale commercialization, and experimental test design. With experience leading research and development for regional, national, and global brands, as well as startup brands, we bring fresh and meaningful perspectives to partnership. Our food innovation understanding spans across the convenience, grocery, and restaurant industries, setting the stage for a dynamic and forward-looking approach to product development.
Menu Development Services
Category Performance Deep Dive
Category Performance Deep Dive
Category Performance Deep Dive
Strengthen Food & Beverage
Incorprate category managment best practices, creative thinking, and critical planning. Great for scaling operations and increasing profitability.
Best for retailers with one or more locations, looking for an outside point of view on food and beverage current performance, and for help perfecting scaled rollouts.
Timeframe: 1-3 months
Includes:
- Category performance analysis
- Profitability assessment by menu item
- Evaluation of quality by ingredient
- Packaging evaluation
- Operations efficiency evaluation
- Customer experience and consistency review
- Marketing review
- Menu innovation recommendations
Menu Refresh
Category Performance Deep Dive
Category Performance Deep Dive
Elevate the Current Offer
Chef collaborations with key vendors to create and serve delicious, inventive new products and line extensions. See the potential of your brand from the eyes of menu and category professionals.
For retailers with an established menu, this option is best for operators who wish to take food and beverages to new heights.
Timeframe: 3-5 months
Includes:
- Category Performance Deep Dive, plus:
- Training on menu innovation best practices
- Pipeline of new products to capitalize on categories that are ripe for innovation
- Optional: Immersion Experience tailored to meet the exploratory needs on your menu
- Optional: In-person cooking demonstrations
Comprehensive Menu Design
Category Performance Deep Dive
Comprehensive Menu Design
Create a Proprietary Menu
Starting from the ground-up, we offer guidance to bring your vision to life.
Best for those new to food and beverages, or new to the restaurant, convenience, or travel center industries, looking for an experienced foodservice professional to design a program from scratch.
Timeframe: 6-12 months
Includes:
- Support to determine goals and targets for performance and profitability
- Exploratory work in collaboration with key suppliers and locally-sourced items
- Competitive analysis
- Equipment and layout recommendations
- Bespoke menu development
- Recipes and cost analysis
- Retail pricing guidance
- Packaging recommendations
- Documented procedures, job aids, and tools to ensure consistency
- Ongoing support post-launch
Profitable Menus
We Develop Menus to Grow Your Profit
Profitability Analysis: Every item should earn it's way onto your menu, and every menu item should have a purpose. We help you align customer needs, operational needs, and profitability targets.
Recipe Calculations: We help you identify the cost per ounce or portion of every single ingredient, and calculate the actual cost of each recipe.
Minimize Waste: The only way to understand the true cost of each menu item is to factor in waste as well. We find opportunities to offer the freshest products while minimizing waste and lowering food costs.
Maximize Margins: We help you reach your gross profit goals by strategically considering retail pricing, waste, sales, and growth targets.
Comprehensive Support
CROSS-FUNCTIONAL COMMUNICATIONS:
Team members need to know what, when, where, how, and why. We provide structured tools for cascading information.
VISUAL JOB AIDS:
Simple. Clear. Concise. Multilingual. Pictures. Food Forward Thinking provides job aids for easy training and consistent execution.
OPERATIONS MANUALS:
Resources like equipment and training manuals, how-to guides, log books and projections... We provide printed and online materials.
TRAINING COURSES:
Food Forward Thinking can turn dry, uninteresting manuals into an engaging instructional course for in-person or online.
IDEA TO TABLE:
You have ideas share, actions to complete, and timelines to meet. We help you craft consistent and streamlined internal communications.