At Foodservice IP, we believe that strategy starts—and ends—with purpose. Not slogans, not dashboards, and certainly not a barrage of data points with no connective tissue. Purpose is about the unique value your firm brings to the table. For food manufacturers, especially those in foodservice or retail foodservice, it’s not a marketing statement—it’s the foundation of decision-making across insight, innovation, and commercialization functions.
Over the years, we’ve seen how easily companies veer off course. One former salesperson of ours, focused on selling dashboards and digital interfaces, once told me, “We were trying to solve a problem with a pistol—now I have a cannon.” The metaphor may have been flashy, but it entirely missed the point. He thought our purpose was to sell tools, not provide clarity. He later moved on to a data firm—fitting, since his idea of strategy was more about quantity than interpretation.
We are not a data warehouse or a tech platform. While many of our competitors offer dashboards and click-through analysis, our work centers on translating research into decisions. That distinction matters. When a company confuses insight collection with insight application, they create noise, not strategy. We’ve found that unless all major business activities—product development, sales targeting, channel prioritization—tie back to a clear purpose, companies are just reacting, not leading.
Let me offer a realistic example.
A Realistic Example: Purpose in Practice
Baker’s Path, a fictional mid-sized bakery ingredient supplier, came to us frustrated. They were investing heavily in consumer insights and developing exciting new inclusion products—swirls, sprinkles, chips—but the results weren’t showing up in sales or adoption among in-store bakery (ISB) customers.
They described their goal as delivering “premium ingredients for bakery innovation,” but when we spoke to their customers—retailers and commissaries—we heard different concerns. ISB teams needed functionality: inclusions that wouldn’t break during freezing, color bleeding that didn’t ruin frosting, and products with shelf-life built in. The flashy new flavors? Often irrelevant.
We helped Baker’s Path reshape their internal alignment around a redefined purpose:
“To be the go-to partner for functional, scalable inclusions that solve retail bakery pain points.”
We worked across their teams—marketing, R&D, and sales—to anchor every initiative to that purpose. Instead of launching three new “trend-forward” flavors, they developed two application-driven inclusions that solved melting and stability issues. Instead of broad B2B outreach, they targeted ISB decision-makers and commissary partners.
Here’s how that alignment looked across key areas:
| Business Area | Before | After Redefining Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| Innovation Focus | Novelty (e.g., birthday cake) | Functionality (e.g., color-stable inclusions) |
| Customer Targeting | Broad B2B foodservice accounts | Retail ISB, commissaries, bakery directors |
| Insights Used | Consumer trends (Gen Z snacks) | Retailer/operator needs, in-case performance |
| Sales Messaging | “New and fun” | “Solves X problem in your process or shelf case” |
In less than six months, Baker’s Path secured a major grocer as a private-label partner based specifically on their new ability to “speak the language of the operator.” Purpose wasn’t just a banner—it became a tool to connect insights with implementation.
Most companies don’t fail because they lack information. They fail because their actions don’t line up with their purpose. In today’s environment—where inflation, labor, and channel convergence challenge everything from pricing to product flow—clarity of purpose is an executive’s most strategic asset.
At Foodservice IP, our role isn’t to drown you in data. It’s to make sure what you’re doing makes sense. If you’re struggling to see the connection between your insights and your outcomes, it may not be a data problem—it may be a purpose problem.
Recommended Reading: Montgomery, Cynthia. The Strategist. Harvard Business School Press, 2012.
Tim Powell is a Principal with Foodservice IP, a professional services firm aimed at delivering ideas for managers to guide informed business decisions.
To learn more about FSIP’s Management Consulting Practice, click here.
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