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The Coca-Cola booth at the 2024 National Restaurant Association Show was a test of taste tolerance.
Between the various types of drinks like Powerade Sour, Body Armor Zero Sugar, Spice Coca-Cola, Sprite Chill, Gold Peak Zero Sugar Iced Tea, Dasani Refreshed, Topo Chico Savorés, Topo Chico Mixers, and Hubert's Lemonade, it was metaphorical to indulge in sweet, faintly fruity, brightly colored drinks.
According to brands and suppliers, the onslaught of sweet but not-so-sweet snacks and drinks is a key element of restaurants' efforts to reach Gen Z consumers.
“Generation Z loves new flavors. They’re really exciting, new, colorful and vibrant,” said Brian Jackson, Coca-Cola’s senior director of channel and customer strategy.
Young consumers want new looks and old tastes
While Gen Z loves visual novelty (the kind you post a lot about on Instagram), these consumers are mostly interested in flavors they already know, says Robert Byrne, CEO of Technomic.
“Only 12 percent of Gen Zers say they actively seek out new flavors,” Byrne said. “Many have recently become adults and have moved beyond childhood. Their preferences are skewed toward sweet and spicy.”
Byrne said Gen Z's favorite flavors may become more complex in the future, but for now, they prefer bold and familiar flavors.
“Bold and boring is one way to look at it,” Byrne said. “Fruit and sweet flavor preferences naturally find their way into drinks, especially.”
Linwood Mallard, chief marketing officer for J&J Snack Foods, said certain types of snack foods, such as churros, have an advantage because younger generations are popular but still want distinctive flavors.
“Our churro business grew over 27 percent last quarter,” Mallard said. “Churros are the target dessert snack. They’re bite-sized, very easy to eat, fun, and a little exotic.”
J&J also makes Icee, a long-lasting, sweet, brightly colored beverage platform. By combining Icee’s well-known format with specific tie-ins (the brand has collaborated with The Smurfs Movie and Ghostbusters), J&J wants to give consumers “permission to be kids again,” Mallard said.
Byrne noted that a direct link to childhood flavors can be useful when marketing to a younger demographic. At the NRA show, J&J debuted Icee, a Froot Loops-flavored cereal that tastes surprisingly similar to the breakfast cereal.
In a June interview with Restaurant Dive, Erin Newkirk, Caribou Coffee’s chief brand and marketing officer, said the brand has seen younger consumers shift from hot coffee to cold brew and now to sweeter, fruitier energy drinks. In May, Caribou Coffee Introduced the line A high-caffeine energy drink based on soda or lemonade.
Caribou Coffee's summer 2024 menu includes fruit shakers and energy drinks, flavors that appeal to Gen Z consumers.
Courtesy of Caribou Coffee
She said Caribou's summer drink performed about twice as well as the company had hoped.
“People are looking for something other than a coffee-based beverage in the afternoon,” Newkirk said. “(They’re) looking for something a little sweeter.”
In the afternoon, Caribou drink more fruit drinks and energy drinks than coffee, although coffee is still the predominant breakfast drink.
Bold and boring flavor combinations were evident elsewhere on the show floor, too, at the Coca-Cola booth, at the Ghirardelli booth, and even off the CosMc's show floor. McDonald's is testing bold and boring drinks 40 minutes from downtown Chicago to balance the margins traditional beverages provide with the operational complexity of custom drinks. That includes one of CosMc's best-selling items, the caffeinated Churro Cold Brew Frappe.
Healthy snacks
Concerns about nutritional content could change the drink's popularity, said Bret Thorn, senior food and beverage editor for Nation's Restaurant News., He said in a panel discussion.
“Everyone is focusing on the nutrition they enjoy,” Thorn said. “We expect to see more nutrient-dense things like berries (into the drink).” Coca-Cola’s proliferation of sugar-free or no-sugar options seems designed to appeal to a market segment that perceives itself as a healthier snacker.
Mallard said Gen Z's desire for healthy-looking options extends from drinks to snacks.
“In the snacking mainstream, you’re going to see a shift toward healthier snacks,” Mallard said. “Whether that means including protein, reducing calories, or controlling portion sizes.”
Kelly Gamble, senior brand director at Tractor Beverage Company, said the same principle applies to beverages when discussing Gen Z's beverage preferences.
“They’re more conscious about what they’re putting in their bodies,” Gamble said, which has led to more non-alcoholic cocktails.
For Coca-Cola, it has launched new SKUs like Powerade Sours, a sugar-free product designed specifically to target health-conscious Gen Z consumers.
The growing preference for healthy foods has led to increased searches for organic and vegetarian options, which may help explain the popularity of fast casual, Allison Lin, Yelp's director of restaurant products, said in an interview.
Caribou Coffee sees this trend as playing to its strengths, Newkirk said. Caribou is looking to use whole ingredients, such as pumpkin puree, in its drinks instead of syrup. It's a pumpkin scented latte.. The brand uses fruit in its summer drinks to provide a healthier sweetness than drinks made with just sugar, but the drinks still contain a lot of sugar—a large strawberry fruit shaker, for example, has 56 grams. for example.
Subway Sidekicks launched in January 2024, offering a footlong snack.
Provided by Subway
Generation Z's Eating Habits
As taste patterns change, so do consumption patterns, often in ways that benefit snacking situations.
“Generation Z is eating in their cars more often than any other generation,” Byrne said, citing the unique time pressures faced by younger consumers.
“More than half said they use restaurants to fill their busy day,” Byrne said.
Many consumers have shifted to the afternoon snack time slot, Newkirk said. These customers are more likely to eat small items like cake pops than full-meal eaters, but food stickiness rates are similar across time slots. Restaurant brands have adapted by adding new snack items to their menus, such as Subway’s footlongs. Dipper and Sidekick.
Social media engagement offers an interactive aspect, and Gen Z consumers spend a lot of time online. In 2022, the Los Angeles Times reported that Gen Z will be Half of my waking hours are spent online.
The fact that many people discover restaurants online has forced tech companies to change the way they present restaurants. Yelp, for exampleLin says she's changing the restaurant discovery process to one that's centered around photos and videos.
“If you look at Yelp’s search results, photos are way ahead,” Lin said. The company is also working to integrate with a number of unspecified social media platforms.
“No matter where our customers live, we can capture that demand,” Lin said.
For Caribou, that meant a lot of social media promotion. The company has a brand ambassador program with more than 300 influencers, according to Newkirk, and is set to launch a TikTok-based promotional dating show later this summer. However, Newkirk couldn’t reveal which influencers would be the hosts.
