After 50 years of being promoted as one of the healthiest choices consumers can make, vegetable oils – the name used to describe the seed oils sunflower, canola and soy – are in trouble. A small but fast-growing percentage of consumers in the US and Europe are trying to avoid them. It’s an emergent free-from, but these free-froms have a habit of growing and becoming important in strategy. This Strategy Briefing explains the consumer and scientific concerns, sets out five steps companies can take, and shows what companies are doing to connect to this emergent consumer need.

Now in its 10th year, our unique five-country consumer survey is a guide to the long-term changes in consumer beliefs about food, nutrition and health. We have developed over the years a reliable way to explore with people what they’re eating, what they are avoiding and why – and this enables us to track long-term changes to discover what is emergent, what is changing, and what has stalled.

Understanding which consumer trends will be the most important – and which strategies you can use to create success for your business – is a super-power for food industry executives. This unique report is written to enable you and your colleagues to develop this super-power. This is the only report that tells you not just what the 10 most important long-term trends are, but also what your opportunities and challenges are going to be, and what you can do about them.