Disruption will continue to challenge our industry in unexpected ways. Tomorrow’s solutions require agility and new approaches. The future demands more expansive thinking and decision-making—and ultimately, more imagination.

We believe that insight is the key to unlocking the power of imagination.

​Yet insight is not a commodity—it is a strategic asset that requires investment, expertise and rigor. It is a source of inspiration, direction and validation for innovation of any scale.

Explore our differentiating approach to  insights and how we’re using it to deliver products that create value — and spark joy — for our customers, and consumers around the world.

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Three Ways We’re Driving Consumer Centricity in Product Design

We look at consumer centricity through an integrated, cross-category lens: building on our legacy to capture trends and consumer needs, decode key markets, and adapt innovation to category specificities.

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1. Know consumers and scope the opportunity

We understand what consumers value, what they need and what they expect – now, and in the future.

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2. Guide product design

Optimal product design requires an understanding of the complete consumer product experience, while defining formulation rules and identifying features that bring the most benefits.

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3. Demonstrate superiority

Our insights help prove product superiority and benefits perceived by consumers, and support our customers in positioning and communicating these benefits.

Activating Insights

Insight is only valuable if it’s used. See how we unlock the full potential of insights with our unique, human and consumer-centric capabilities, transforming them into actionable strategies that drive success.​

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Trend & Foresight Intelligence

Through PANOPTIC, IFF’s proprietary Trend & Foresight tool, we organize and track the most impactful people-centric shifts and dynamics shaping the short-, mid- and long-term future of the industries we work in. Through a shared understanding of the most influential trends impacting the world today and tomorrow, we can confidently and creatively identify the opportunities that lie ahead.

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Consumer Understanding

To create superior products and experiences people love, we must understand consumer typologies, needs, occasions, aspirations, tastes and preferences. IFF’s breadth and depth in decoding consumer typologies, moments and future vision—together within our trend and foresight framework—provides clear direction for innovation and identifies new opportunities for growth.

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Product Experience

We understand that product experience is the perception consumers have of a product based on their engagement with it. We optimize that consumer product experience by providing insightful intelligence to guide product design, development and formulation, driving value creation for our customers better and faster than anyone else in the industry.

GUIDING PRODUCT DESIGN

Magic Moments

There are key moments that occur within the entire product experience—from shopping to experiencing—when consumers assess a product and decide if it lives up to their expectations. By understanding these “magic moments”, we can identify the most critical product features and design products that ensure consumer satisfaction and long-term adoption.​​

Utilizing this unique capability—combining, for instance, ethnography and dynamic sensory profiling—we have uncovered unexpected insights on many different end-uses in markets ranging from scent boosters in China to stock cubes in Nigeria.

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GUIDING PRODUCT DESIGN

How Do Consumers Really Feel?

Emotions are not always easily perceived—or easy to verbalize. So how can we truly know how a consumer feels about a product?​

Through implicit physiological and brain activity measures, we gain valuable insights into how products can trigger powerful emotions and memories.​

In a recent U.S. study on plant-based burgers, a survey combining explicit and implicit data revealed that consumers’ brain and body reactions often contradicted their stated preferences.​ And in the fragrance market, our Science of Wellness capability enabled Charlotte Tilbury to substantiate strong emotional claims to position and differentiate their fragrance collection.

Insights gained from combining explicit and implicit data is extremely useful to guide product design, resulting in products that not only seem good, but will truly feel good to the consumer.

 

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GUIDING PRODUCT DESIGN

Predicting Consumer Liking

With our Best In Class (BIC) program, we uncover the drivers of liking for specific end-uses and markets.​​

​By systematically analyzing how consumers react to various sensorial modalities, we expand the traditional flavor and fragrance space and establish creation rules through data science, enabling us to build reliable models to predict what consumers like.​​

This has been proven effectively on many occasions—for example, from the popularity of Lemon-Lime beverages in China and strawberry flavor in dairy in Europe, to Fabric Care in Africa!

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PROVING SUPERIORITY

Validating Emotional Benefits

With our ScentEmotions™, BrainEmotions™ and Beyond Hedonics™ programs, utilizing our extensive database of implicit and explicit insights, we often design flavors and fragrances with the intent to support emotional benefits. But does it work?​

Consumers report that 75% of the time, the creations deliver the intended emotional benefit. Additionally, 50% of the time, we can demonstrate these emotional benefits through measurable body and brain responses.​

So how can we make you a happy fragrance or flavor?

  • 75%
    of consumers report the intended emotional benefit
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KEEP EXPLORING

Discover IFF’s Proprietary Trend & Foresight Capability

Looking beyond consumer trends, PANOPTIC is a framework unique to IFF, enabling us to study and identify the most impactful shifts and dynamics shaping the short-, mid- and long-term future of the markets we serve.

By uniting synergetic disciplines of trend-, consumer- and market experts across the entire IFF organization, this approach generates intelligence and insights that inspire and drive future-proof innovation for our customers around the world.

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