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• Experiential dining is an existing trend that can be integrated into many food and beverage products using some key sensory marketing strategies.
• When foodies link their favorites to an emotional experience, including experiential and story-driven flavors, they tend to come back for more of the same.
• Metarom USA helps guide you in your journey toward creating culturally-inspired taste profiles in your products.

Foodies want the whole package when it comes to enjoying and savoring their favorite meal or drinks. This means going beyond the perfect flavor and plate presentation and creating a memorable eating experience–maybe even putting a story behind the flavor and composition of a dish. The concept of experiential and story-driven flavors is nothing new, but the idea is a growing trend that now permeates restaurant menus, social media, and beyond.

What Is Experiential Dining?

The experiential dining movement emphasizes unique immersive flavor ‘experiences’ that leave you wanting to come back for more, and using experiential and story-driven flavors banks on you telling your friends (or using social media to share) about that incredible dining experience you had and expanding the market base through word of mouth.

Have you ever been to a Brazilian steakhouse? Part of that emotional eating experience is the active presentation of a variety of delicacies with culturally-inspired taste profiles served by your gaucho (server). As you eat, you stay active and use a red/green coaster on your table to subtly signal to them that you are ready for more or prepared for a pause.

Experiential dining and story-driven flavors can be integrated into other settings, too. They may take root in a story your server tells you before setting the meal out. The experience could be as simple as a make-you-own or cook-your-own experience (teppanyaki, anyone?). Other layers of this include sensory marketing strategies, such as a specific setting, intentional presentation, or live entertainment, as you enjoy your meal or drinks.

What Are Story-Driven Flavors?

Using storytelling in food branding is nothing new. There are amazing stories behind many of our culinary favorites. Take maple syrup; there’s a fantastic opportunity for experiential and story-driven flavors in any dish utilizing one of North America’s favorite flavorings. Diners can picture an emotional eating experience like tapping a maple tree and visiting a sugar shack to collect the delectable syrup they love drizzling on their pancake or waffle breakfast. This is just one example of a story-driven flavor.

How can you integrate story-driven flavors into your food or beverage brand? There exist tremendous opportunities for immersive flavor experiences and culturally-inspired taste profiles in everyday products that hit the store shelf. Our team at Metarom USA can help you tailor a story by using sensory marketing strategies proven to work worldwide.

Using Experiential and Story-Driven Flavors To Enhance the Emotional Eating Experience

How you select flavors for a new or existing product can make a huge difference in how they sell on the market. There’s a story behind every flavor that can add to perceived quality, authenticity, and experience. One example of this is your basic vanilla flavor, a widespread and well-known addition to many culinary creations. You find vanilla in snacks, shakes, protein bars, ice cream, and more–but do you ever pause and think about where it comes from?

Using storytelling in food branding means you can integrate the story of vanilla into your creation. Going beyond the basic flavor, you should invoke a location. Tahitian vanilla flavor might induce a more emotional eating experience when you tie it to its roots. Using experiential and story-driven flavors means drawing from culturally-inspired taste profiles and sensory marketing strategies. Explore some of our best vanilla varieties and reach out to learn more about integrating these story-driven flavors into your products.

Other Flavors Rooted in History

Our flavor technicians at Metarom have decades of experience in the industry. Although we offer an extensive catalogue of flavor choices inspired by global food trends, we have specific expertise in experiential and story-driven flavors rooted in longstanding tradition. Explore our selection of vanilla and caramel flavors backed by a collective 100 years of experience crafting those flavors and extracts.

Metarom USA offers flavors in a variety of forms, including powders and inclusions, specks, syrups, extracts, and fillings. Looking for a longer shelf-life or a bake-stable product? We’ve got you. Our flavors are also SQF, Kosher, and organic-certified, meaning you’ll easily cater to the dietary needs of a wide range of buyers without missing out on significant market opportunities. Our experienced team of flavor chemists will help you design an emotional eating experience rooted in both traditional and culturally-inspired taste profiles.

Consult Metarom USA

Discover a range of experiential and story-driven flavors and begin your journey toward using storytelling in food branding. Reach out to Metarom USA for guidance on using select sensory marketing strategies to guarantee success on a local and global scale. We specialize in collaborating with large and small-scale brands to expand or tailor existing product lines, making them work for niche markets.

Browse our full catalog online and discover new flavors, clean-label solutions, functional flavor formulations, and more. Reach out for a free sample today.