The Seven Deadly Sins of Product Development

March 2003

The Seven Deadly Sins of Product Development

By Deborah SilverContributing Editor

The downside is grim. Only one new product idea in 58 actually makes it through the development process and yields a successful new product, according to a study by Booz Allen Hamilton Inc., McLean, VA. But the potential upside for that one winning product is enormous. Some companies realize a whopping 50% of their sales and 40% of their profits from products that are less than five years old.

“New-product development is a lot like raising kids,” says Jim Doak, CEC, director of menu development and innovation, Applebee’s International, Inc., Overland Park, KS. “Nothing works for sure, but some things work a lot better than others.”

In an effort to uncover what works, companies invest significant dollars to improve new-product processes. Some use complex mapping systems with hundreds of steps, while others opt for simpler product-development routes. But no matter the process, avoiding certain pitfalls along the way can mean the difference between product success and product failure.

In the beginningThou shalt not proceed without management commitment. While many development teams start the new-product process with the search for the right idea, senior management’s commitment to the product requires an honest assessment before taking that first step. If management’s motivation is strictly to increase short-term profits, other, lower-risk, courses of action are likely a better route than the costly development and launch of a new product. However, if the impetus stems from a strategic assessment that a new product is necessary to meet key business objectives, then the driving force needed to support the new-product process, including talent, organizational structure, time and money, will be greater.

“When the main motivation is to please Wall Street with a blockbuster product, a company often takes shortcuts in best practices and pushes the product out the door too quickly,” says Colleen Zammer, senior manager with TIAX LLC, a consulting firm in Cambridge, MA. “It’s important to create a product that takes into account the needs of all the stakeholders, from consumers to management, and to make the appropriate tradeoffs.”

Indeed, new-product development is a team effort. “The whole team must be focused on the forward progress of the whole project,” Zammer says. However, she adds that lack of proper support from top management is at the root of many new-product failures. Without it, the creative environment necessary to create breakthrough products is often missing. And if senior managers are not involved throughout the process, critical issues may be overlooked. “New-product development requires the ability to synthesize detailed consumer and product information, food-science technology and financial data,” she continues. “You need seasoned managers to handle that level of complexity.”

Thou shalt not ignore the formulator’s dilemma. Today’s consumer wants to taste the nuances of specific cooking methods, such as stir-frying, sautéing, roasting and grilling, but replicating those cooking techniques in retail food production is no easy task. If the goal of a new product is to create the flavor associated with a specific technique, the designer first must understand the chemistry associated with the creation of that flavor.

“You need to use ingredient technology — not processing technology, to deliver the authentic flavor profiles of cooking methods, such as grilling and sautéing,” says Lucien Vendôme, senior executive chef for Kraft Food Ingredients Corp., Memphis, TN. “But in order for those flavor systems to provide value, they must also be formulated to survive manufacturing processes and, ultimately, deliver the desired flavor profile to the consumer.”

Developers should also take into account consumer expectation for specific food textures. For example, when formulating a creamy gravy with a full flavor profile, food scientists must choose a thickener that performs during processing and storage conditions so that the finished food looks and feels as good as it does in a restaurant. For thinner sauces with enhanced mouthfeel, traditional culinary techniques — such as reduction — build just enough viscosity without too much thickening, but sauce reduction is not always an option in a manufacturing facility. As a result, specialty ingredients that offer texture without viscosity must be used. “Typically, retail products have to endure more abuse than foodservice-restaurant products, and the desired attributes can be hard to deliver,” says Vendôme. “It’s a difficult and delicate balancing act that involves trial and error, time and testing.”

Tasting and testingThou shalt not disregard today’s discerning taste buds. Consumers’ tastes have become more sophisticated, and since taste drives consumer satisfaction and, thus, product success, today’s flavors need to be more refined, authentic-tasting and distinctive. They also need to hit the mark when it comes to the latest flavor trends.

Flavoring systems for ethnic products are expected to be pivotal for the next 12 months, particularly foods, flavors and cooking methods from Cuba, South America and Vietnam. Natural and organic ingredients are also important growth areas, although difficulty in developing organic products continues since a lack of organic-ingredient manufacturers makes those ingredients difficult to source. Similarly, in their effort to pursue more-healthful lifestyles, consumers are looking for authenticity and freshness in prepared foods.

Vertical flavors are also gaining in importance, including flavors that mimic double processing, such as roasting. “When you cook, all of the flavor notes have a relationship because they build on each other,” says Vendôme. Pork and beef value-added products, in particular, will benefit from this trend.

Layering flavors to create bold profiles is also moving to the forefront. This technique includes combining sweet flavors, such as vanilla, honey and fruits, with spicy flavors, such as red pepper and mustard; or using dessert spices, such as cinnamon, in a main course — southwestern cinnamon steak rub, for example; and main-course herbs in desserts, such sorbets.

“The whole category of flavors that provide sensory excitement and bold sensations will continue,” says Abe Sendros, market research analyst with McCormick Flavors, Hunt Valley, MD. “Everyone is trying to infuse more flavor into every bite.”

Thou shalt not skimp on testing. In their efforts to get new products out of the lab and out to the public, food-product developers often overlook the amount of time it takes to demonstrate that a product is microbiologically safe and has the desired shelf life, waiting until late in the product-development cycle to assess what testing needs to be done to ensure product safety or longevity. “Often, companies want you to confirm that a product is safe based on its formula, or that a product has the shelf life that they’re aiming for,” says Michael Curiale, Ph.D., technical director of Silliker Laboratories Group, Inc. in Homewood, IL. “They don’t want you to tell them that involved testing needs to be done to make sure that bacterial pathogens won’t grow in their product, or that the only way to make sure a refrigerated product has a shelf life of a specified number of weeks is to test it for that specified number of weeks.”

Companies also assume that if a product is similar to that of another company, it is safe, ignoring such factors as differences in ingredient sources, manufacturing processes and sanitation. “Products may have the same name, but if manufactured by two different companies, they’re apples and oranges as far as testing is concerned,” says Curiale.

According to Zammer, built-in stopping points, or milestones, are critical throughout the development process to make sure that every aspect of the process is being addressed. “At each critical juncture — and testing is very critical — you need to look at what has been accomplished and what needs to be accomplished,” she says. “You need to talk to your quality-assurance people, for example, and ask, ‘What about testing?’ And if necessary, you adjust the time frame of your product launch, not the time frame of the testing. Companies would be able to launch products with a lot more confidence if they knew their testing objectives had been met.”

Bringing to marketThou shalt not overlook packaging dos and don’ts. Convenience is the top decision-maker in determining which foods go in the shopping cart. Consumers may eat several meals per week on the run, but most still eat the majority of meals at home. And with the economy in the doldrums, consumers are expected to spend increasingly less on restaurant dining and more on timesaving take-home products that simplify putting a balanced meal on the table.

But convenience alone is not enough. Companies must mesh convenience with ways to differentiate their products from the competition. Ease of use may be paramount, but manufacturers must also put attention-grabbing graphics and shapes into play. Premarinated and/or precooked branded meats, shelf-stable and frozen home-meal kits, hand-held snacks, foods in big bowls, and products with health benefits are now common grocery items. The trick is to develop a package that stands out from the pack.

However, when it comes to grab-and-go eats from fast-food restaurants, convenience typically needs to override packaging aesthetics. When consumers drive and dine, they do not want to end up with sauce or condiments on their laps. The point to remember here is form should always follow function.

Thou shalt not fall short on marketing efforts. Maintaining product quality from idea stage through product release should be at the forefront of product-development processes, but companies often fail to delegate that responsibility. According to Cheryl Ahlbrandt, vice president of marketing for Village Inn and Baker’s Square, a division of Denver-based Vicorp Restaurants, Inc., the prevention of quality drift should be a marketing responsibility. “Good marketers understand the consumer’s needs and how to translate them to product objectives,” she says.

Products may also fail because the marketing team fails to translate consumer benefits into the correct products or marketing message. “The ideas and business cases may be good, but the execution can kill the opportunity,” says Ahlbrandt. “You need a savvy understanding of the consumer, rather than blindly following consumer-research numbers, to make decisions.”

Often marketers will misinterpret what consumers want to know about a product. Consumers, for example, may talk a lot about health, but they are not interested in buying products based on their disease-prevention benefits, according to Thomas Payne, president of Thomas Payne Market Development in San Francisco. “Consumers want a halo of goodness and health around a product,” he says. “They don’t want to know that it’s beneficial for your colon or that it inhibits cancer-causing tumors.” In other words, positive marketing works; disease-based marketing does not. The failed effort to get consumers to buy low-fat and fat-free products is a good example of a marketing misstep.

Food products that have experienced marketplace gains of more than 50% in the past five years have focused on women’s issues, athletic improvement, eye health, and skin and hair benefits, according to Payne. “The key is to appeal to people’s vanity,” he concludes.

Fearing finalityThou shalt not be afraid to kill an idea. Companies must be willing to kill weak ideas as early as possible. Great streams of product development effort are expended on ideas long before it is known if the effort is worth the investment.

Sorting out weak ideas is difficult, but not impossible. A company must first identify its unique strengths before undertaking any new product development. Introducing an appealing consumer product that requires skills a company has not yet fully developed leaves the door open for a competitor with those skills to copy the product, and win in the marketplace by leveraging its strengths, according to Zammer. “Understand the consumer need or benefit, and the company’s core competencies,” she conludes. “A match usually provides a real opportunity for product success.”

Deborah Silver is a business journalist based in the Chicago area who specializes in the foodservice industry. Her coverage has included restaurant chains, food safety, industry and consumer trends, financing, and government policy, and she has written articles for numerous publications, including the Chicago Tribune and The Washington Post.

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