Divergence

Trend - Just a few years after AI-powered chefs debuted in numerous restaurant pilots, brands are now adapting this technology to the home kitchen. These cooking devices help ensure consistency in cooking while making the process more efficient due to their advanced AI.

Insight - Luxury consumers favor convenience and automation in the home as time-saving measures, rather than cost-saving ones. These consumers have extra money they are willing to spend to make their busy lives easier, leading to fully-equipped smart homes or appliances on timers. One area these strive for more automation in is the kitchen. Previously, these consumers would hire personal human chefs if they did not enjoy cooking themselves. Brands are filling this luxe gap through the use of AI.

Trend - New artificial intelligence (AI)-powered startups are launching tools that create detailed custom videos from detailed text prompts. These tools use generative AI to quickly create and edit videos to the users' liking, which is excellent for creative expression and advertising alike.

Insight - With the influx of artificial intelligence services, consumers and businesses alike are becoming increasingly familiar with integrating this technology into daily tasks. These generative AI tools offer near-instant results for consumers with creative ideas, individual startups, or even large-scale businesses working on ad campaigns. The promise of fast, affordable, personalized products from generative AI has led to consumers gravitating towards these services over alternatives.

Trend - Brands in the men's health space are launching sexual health products with discreet packaging and branding. These treatments are for conditions such as erectile dysfunction without exposing the consumer. From the shipping packaging to the branding, the products are masked for privacy.

Insight - While research suggests that one in ten men in the United States are faced with erectile dysfunction-related challenges at some point, most men are hesitant to discuss the topic as acknowledging these conditions can make men feel embarrassed. However, these men still desire treatment and solutions, as they don't want to be inhibited by symptoms in the most crucial moments. As a result, these men are gravitating towards discreet products that hide the treatment purpose on the package.

Trend - Brands are launching apps that assist men with managing sexual wellness problems. These apps offer users privacy and security and offer professional support, including recommended products or lifestyle changes. These apps help men maintain sexual health while being discrete.

Insight - One of the largest barriers that prevents men from seeking help for sexual wellness problems is pride. Many men do not want to acknowledge these issues for fear of feeling lesser. As a result, these men either attempt to find their own solutions through OTC products, or seek help online anonymously. These men desire professional-level help that is unintrusive to their lifestyle and does not require associating their identity to their challenges, leading to privacy-focused support apps.

Trend - Users on various social media pages are sharing simplistic, personalizable pasta recipes with cheese as a base. These recipes are accessible enough for any user to join the trend and versatile enough for each content creator to add their own touch to the viral dishes.

Insight - One of the main attractions to food and home cooking is that it brings people together. One evergreen desire for modern consumers is interpersonal connection. People enjoy cooking with their families, friends, and even strangers. When people find breakthroughs or believe strongly in a dish, they take to the internet to share it with others worldwide. These recipes become viral due to a consumer desire for connection and interaction with content creators and other users.

Trend - Brands in the micro-mobility space have begun using hydraulic braking mechanisms in e-bikes and e-scooters. These brakes are more expensive than standard mechanical brakes but are safer and more reliable when braking at high speeds, which are more often achieved by e-bikes and e-scooters.

Insight - Traditional bike consumers are familiar with maintenance and small repairs on their bikes. However, consumers drawn to e-bikes and e-scooters are more motivated by convenience and are less willing to perform maintenance to ensure the bike is in perfect working order. These consumers are willing to pay larger premiums upfront to not spend on maintenance costs downstream, leading to brands using premium alternatives for components that are more prone to fail.

Trend - Many AI chatbots currently exist to offer utilities to customers, such as help with complex questions on nearly any topic. Companies are now launching chatbots with more personality-focused models that offer virtual companionship to users. These chatbots learn their users and form bonds.

Insight - A combination of advanced artificial intelligence gaining traction and customers being increasingly isolated due to scaled back in-person events means consumers are currently experiencing more loneliness than in the previous decade. These customers resort to online communities and networks for companionship while at home, though these communities are not always accessible or available. Brands are responding to this by leveraging AI language models to create companionship chatbots.

Trend - Brands are turning to food-grade resin packaging for its low environmental impact, its comparable performance to unsustainable packaging, and its affordability. These packaging solutions make products more appealing to consumers as brands can market the sustainability of the product inside as well as its packaging.

Insight - While consumers are increasingly drawn to sustainability across numerous industries, the food & beverage and beauty industries are especially scrutinized for their environmental impacts. Consumers in these spaces not only vote with their dollars against brands that remain using unsustainable or animal-cruel methods, but are also willing to boycott products that fall into these categories. This places pressure on brands in the space to transform traditionally unsustainable packaging, such as plastic bottles, with newer, more eco-friendly materials.

Trend - E-bike brands are launching fewer bike models in favor of modular attachments. This enables lower-cost bikes with additional revenue gained from module sales. This trend reduces the barrier to entry, enabling customers to start with a necessities-only bike and build function over time.

Insight - The two largest barriers preventing traditional bike riders from adopting e-bikes are costs and battery concerns. These riders do not want to spend three times the cost of a traditional bike for an e-bike that is often equipped with unneeded features. However, no-frills bikes often run out of utility once multiple situations are considered. Therefore, these consumers desire affordable, entry-level bikes with clear downstream upgrade paths when more features are desired.

Trend - Brands in the food and beverage industry are launching energy drinks made with organic recipes. These energy drinks take what are typically considered unhealthy products and redefine them as healthy alternatives. These drinks provide natural caffeine supplements to health-focused consumers.

Insight - As more consumers place a focus on health and continue to influence those around them, the wellness industry has found room to grow into more everyday food and beverage products. These consumers are drawn to drinks with zero-sugar, organic, and plant-based labels, while they stay away from processed, unhealthy products. This has created a space in the market for new brands and products to emerge that diversify the market, offering natural, healthy versions of commonly unhealthy foods.