AI transforms the food and drink industry

The food and beverage industry is among the many sectors which are seeing rapid expansion of AI usage. While AI can be used for a range of uses, many businesses are focusing on AI’s potential to offer consumer insight and creating customized experiences.

AI technology for food and beverages Tastewise analyses information from sources such as social media, kitchen analytics, and restaurant menus to provide user-owned companies that include PepsiCo, Kraft Heinz, Nestle, Mars and Givaudan with trends in the market as well as digital marketing strategies and insights into foodservice execution. Although Tastewise provides these specific services to clients who are not individual customers, Miriam Aniel, head of marketing communications, explained that Tastewise also creates monthly reports and an annual report on trends in food for the year ahead to give insight to the larger market.

“The catalysts [of increasing AI adoption] in our industry are similar to what we’ve seen elsewhere: an abundance of data, the need for efficiency and the survival of the fittest,” said Paul Kavanagh, founder of BevSuite, which is an email software company that specializes in marketing for retailers of spirits and wine. BevSuite recently unveiled a brand new platform that is powered by AI to create promo emails within a short period of time, and also with better sales conversions according to the company.

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What’s the driving force behind brands’ desire to tap into AI?

Aniel was in agreement with Kavanagh’s ideas that the huge amount of data in industries like food and drinks can be a great source to the development of effective AI applications, particularly for precise trend analysis and customer personalization. These insights provide excellent customer experiences and aid in the development of custom marketing and sales strategies for corporate aspects of the business. She explained that AI is also useful for enhancing the operations side of companies that deal with food and beverages.

“AI can streamline operations, optimize supply chains, and reduce waste, all of which are critical factors in the food industry,” Aniel stated.

BevSuite’s retail-focused AI platform is focused on personalization of emails, pulling on its more than 500,000 bottles of wine and spirits it has in its system to create promotions faster.

“Our customers can generate revenue from those emails with a turnkey ‘buy now’ solution,” explained Kavanagh. “This generates sales, builds customer loyalty, and drives in-store visits, without the need for an existing online store — secure payments and order management are built in.”

He further stated that these usage cases will expand throughout the sector, with a particular focus on the retail food and beverage market.

“Over time we’ll see AI enabling hyper-personalized customer experiences while automating most if not all of the repetitive manual tasks that burden retailers,” Kavanagh said. Kavanagh. “It’s only going to amplify the digital transformation that began for many retailers during the pandemic.”

Overcoming challenges

While AI appears to be a straightforward and seamless solution for many issues, the technology is not without its difficulties. Kavanagh states that it is essential to ensure the accuracy and integrity of its database, as well as improving the system’s performance to be precise, accurate and suitable to the industry of alcohol.

“We overcame this by implementing rigorous data validation processes and by automating continuous updates,” he said.

Aniel said that a further obstacle is the fact that the industry of food is often dispersed, leading to problems like potential disputes as well as the need for labor-intensive professional services, and waste of resources.

“Convincing traditional food industry players to adopt AI-driven solutions can be challenging due to existing workflows and systems across teams, especially at large organizations,” she said.

In the meantime, as Tastewise, BevSuite, and other AI companies attempt to overcome these challenges, The use of technology within the company will continue to grow because more information is gathered and made accessible, and it will be able to identify the needs, wants, and expectations regarding beverages and food experiences.

“AI will continue to play a significant role in product development, marketing, and supply chain optimization,” said Aniel. “We can expect increased use of AI-driven tools to monitor consumer trends and preferences in real time, and to generate content, product ideas and more to meet those preferences.”

In keeping with this, Kavanagh emphasizes that AI’s transformational potential extends beyond the normal applications and will transform the entire field.