Trends we spotted | week 3
At horecatrends.com we spot many national and international trends on a daily basis. We pick the most interesting ones to write about, the other trends we use in our weekly column ‘Trends we spotted this week’.
With this week links to articles about amongst others a trial with a four-day working week in the United Kingdom and have you heard of the hotel chain REVERB by Hard Rock? They open this year in the St. Pauli bunker in Hamburg.
A ‘Travel with Confidence’-program from Baha Mar Resorts in the Bahamas should give their guests the confidence to travel to their resorts. And Accor announced more than 300 new destinations to discover around the world. Including the opening of the Raffles at the OWO building in London.
The exclusive Flyfish Club, is expected to open in New York City in 2023. Your membership card for this exclusive club and restaurant is an NFT purchased with cryptocurrency.
‘Sunions’ onions are already available in America and the United Kingdom, the special thing about these onions: you don’t get tears in your eyes when cutting! And the partner support for the National Week Without Meat & Dairy in the Netherlands is greater than ever.
Dutch chefs Jonnie Boer (*** Michelin) and Sidney Schutte (**) developed baby food for Babe Baby Foods and chef Michael van ‘t Hoff launched the ‘Smaakpupil’, (taste bud) app for people who are confronted with a loss of taste.
At KFC China you can find more and more regional dishes on the menu such as noodles, congee, pancakes, rice rolls and bean curd pudding. And Poland has the most autonomous stores that work with artificial intelligence in Europe, Żabka Nano has 25 locations!
Click on the title if you like to read the full article. Enjoy reading!
Trial for a four-day working week in the UK
During the last couple of months we spotted some restaurants starting with a four-day working week, to balance their work and private hours. Now we also spotted a trial for a 4 day week in London. A six-month trial is poised to include around 30 companies in Britain, with employees involved receiving the same pay they would for a five-day week, in exchange for full productivity over four days. This pilot is led by 4 Day Week Global, in conjunction with think tank Autonomy, the 4 Day Week Campaign, plus academics from both Oxford and Cambridge Universities. The scheme doesn’t stop in the UK either, with similar trials expected to be carried out in the US, Canada, Australia and more. So far, six companies in the UK have joined up the pilot, with the final number expected to be between 20 and 30. It seems that there is a similar trial in Spain as well.
Hard Rock Hotels brings REVERB by Hard Rock to Europe
Hard Rock Hotels announced plans for the opening of its newest REVERB by Hard Rock set to take center stage in Hamburg, Germany. Slated to open in mid-2022, the RIMC Hotels & Resorts Group will operate the hotel with a total of 134 rooms.
The REVERB Hamburg will be located within the St. Pauli Bunker, Hamburg’s largest and one of its few preserved high-rise bunkers, which has to come to locally represent creativity and urban culture. With a similar philosophy, the REVERB by Hard Rock brand strives to be an energetic cultural hub that provides space for locals and travelers to connect and create together. For more information, see the link in the title.
Accor welcomes 2022 with a diverse array of spectacular new properties
Accor is pleased to reveal some of its newest properties and upcoming destinations that guests and world travelers can look forward to visiting in 2022 and beyond. Many of the world’s most exciting destinations such as London, Doha, and Moscow, will welcome multiple new Accor hotels this year, while several Accor brands have sought out exotic, unexpected or new horizons to explore, such as Pangkalan Bun in Indonesia; Copenhagen, Denmark; and Casco Viejo in Panama City.
One of the most anticipated openings of the year is Raffles in London at the OWO. This architectural masterpiece, located at the historic Old War Office – the iconic Whitehall building inhabited by Britain’s most famous statesmen and spies, from Winston Churchill to Ian Fleming – is in the final touches of a monumental transformation to create 120 rooms and suites, 85 unique branded residences and 11 destination restaurants and bars. For more about the upcoming plans of Accor, link in the title.
World’s first ‘Travel with Confidence’ program continues at Baha Mar
Baha Mar, the leading resort destination in The Bahamas, pledges to uphold its industry-leading Travel with Confidence program. A first-of-its-kind initiative, and the only program of this type in the world, Baha Mar continues its commitments to create the safest and healthiest environment for all guests during the ongoing global health crisis and ever evolving travel and entry protocols.
Originally introduced in February 2021, Baha Mar’s Travel with Confidence program promises that should a resort guest test positive for COVID-19 during their stay, Baha Mar will provide courtesy accommodations and a daily dining credit of $150 per person per day, for up to 14 days in quarantine. Alternatively, should the guest choose to return to the United States earlier, Baha Mar will provide private jet travel for guests and their immediate family to the U.S., free of charge. Please see link in title for more information regarding their program.
The ‘World’s First NFT Restaurants is opening in 2023
After infiltrating pretty much every other industry, NFTs have finally entered the world of private dining. The exclusive Flyfish Club, which is set to open in New York City in 2023, works like any other members-only joint except that your membership card is an NFT purchased via cryptocurrency. A non-fungible token is a unique digital asset that can be securely stored or traded on the blockchain.
The Flyfish Club’s regular membership, which gets you into the cocktail lounge, the high-end seafood restaurant and private events, will currently set you back around 3.8 Ethereum, or approximately $12,481 at the current exchange rate. The top-tier omakase membership, meanwhile, was going for 7.8 Ethereum ($25,620) at the time of this writing. As the name implies, this membership also includes access to a 14-seat omakase room. Please see the link in the title for more information.
Tearless ‘Sunion’ Onions Now Being Sold in the UK
‘Sunions‘, the onions that are triple-tested to ensure they won’t make you cry, have been available in the US now at select retailers like Costco, Aldi, and Kroger. Now, the ground-breaking innovation has jumped the Atlantic and made its way to the United Kingdom, as it’s now being sold at Waitrose stores throughout the country.
Sunions are not a genetically modified product and were grown through an all-natural cross-breeding program. Unlike all other onions, Sunions become sweeter every day. Volatile compounds in onions are responsible for tearing and pungent flavor and the amounts of those compounds in other onions remain the same or increase over time. In Sunions, these compounds do the exact opposite and decrease to create a tearless, sweet and mild onion.
Chefs Jonnie Boer (*** Michelin) and Sidney Schutte (**) develop baby food for Babe Baby Foods
Babe, known for its healthy and culinary baby food has created two special editions together with star chefs Jonnie Boer of De Librije*** and Sidney Schutte**. Two culinary flavors that will be added to the existing Babe collection of 6 flavors, from 8 months to 99 years.
Jonnie Boer has developed a fresh taste with a combination of pumpkin, mango and kiwi complemented by fiber-rich oatmeal and banana. This dish is great for breakfast or a snack. Sidney Schutte, father of 2 young children has created a dinner/lunch dish. This dish with beet, fresh apple, coconut milk, fresh herbs and spices is a pleasant surprise.
Partner support National Week Without Meat & Dairy bigger than ever
This year’s National Week Without Meat & Dairy in the Netherlands has connected 79 partners. The campaign is widely supported by the food industry, including companies in the plant-based meat, fish and dairy industries, and several major supermarkets. The fifth edition of National Week Without Meat has the addition ‘& Dairy’ for the first time this year and will take place from March 7 to 13.
KFC China has regional menu items to cater to local tastes
Yum China Holdings, Inc. announced that its KFC brand is increasingly tapping into regional Chinese cuisines and adding traditional local dishes to its menu. In 2021, to support further market penetration and meet the diversified needs of Chinese consumers, KFC launched 12 regionally inspired menu items across dayparts and introduced regional menu items for the first time. Over the years, localization has been a strategic focus for KFC’s food innovation in China, including through the introduction of Chinese breakfast products, such as congee, pancakes, rice rolls and bean curd pudding.
In January 2021, KFC launched hot dry noodles at more than 100 stores in Wuhan, making it the first noodle product since entering China. In September 2021, after launching a series of locally inspired snacks in different cities, hot dry noodles became the first regional menu item to launch at KFC stores nationwide as a Limited Time Offer (“LTO”). Over 1 million bowls of hot dry noodles were sold within a week of launching, becoming KFC’s best performing LTO breakfast item in the past three years. More in the press release, link in the title.
Żabka Nano autonomous stores powered by AiFi outpace industry with 25 live locations in Poland
Żabka Group is now the largest chain of autonomous stores in Europe after launching 25 AI-powered stores called Żabka Nano. The innovative concept enables quick shopping without checkout clerks, queues, or cash to sell products precisely matched to location and customer demographics. The stores operate in several formats such as standalone shipping container-inspired stores, traditional brick-and-mortar and store-within-a-store points of sale; each leveraging AI-powered computer vision technology created through close cooperation with American technology company AiFi. More in the press release at PRNewswire, link in the title.
