The Food People

What The Food People does

The Food People is a UK-based B2B food and beverage trend intelligence agency headquartered in Eastbourne, England, founded in 2004/2006 by Charles Banks and Wayne Edwards. The company operates the trendhub online community platform, which delivers trend reports, articles, videos, infographics, and interactive maps across five content streams: foodwatching, drinkswatching, healthwatching, menuwatching, and categorywatching. Its proprietary research IP and methodologies, built on 20 years of archives, underpin an interactive trend framework that connects current trend manifestations to a 24-month foresight horizon. The Menuwatching tool provides analytics across hundreds of menus and tens of thousands of menu items, while a free TFP Community of 13,000+ members and a free Annual Food & Beverage Trend Summit (3,300+ attendees) drive top-of-funnel demand.

The company's revenue model combines recurring trendhub subscriptions with a freemium content layer and one-time digital product sales (notably the 2025 "20 Years in Food & Beverage Trends" e-book priced at £24). Enterprise sales are conducted through complimentary 30-minute demo sessions where bespoke trend reports are built live on the call. Customers are primarily large multinational food manufacturers, beverage companies, retailers, and hospitality operators — including Coca-Cola, Nestle, Unilever, Waitrose, Sainsbury's, M&S, IHG, Hilton Foods, Greencore, Samworth Brothers, and Finsbury Food Group. Secondary segments include government, education, and media/PR. Geographic reach spans the UK, USA, Australasia, and Europe, delivered via a digital-first model.

The business is entirely founder-owned, with no disclosed institutional investment, and has launched the TFP Foundation (November 2020) as a charitable arm that donates 1p per £1 of revenue to Chefs in Schools and The Food Foundation, having contributed over £185,000 since inception. Headcount is in the 11-50 band, supporting an estimated mid-single-digit-million-pound annual revenue run-rate, with growth driven by platform expansion, content stream development, and the annual summit franchise.

Name

The Food People

Legal name

The Food People Limited

Website

https://thefoodpeople.co.uk

Company type

Private

Founded year

2006

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

The Food People is a UK-based B2B food and beverage trend intelligence agency operating the trendhub platform. It serves enterprise clients including Coca-Cola, Nestle, Unilever, and Waitrose with subscription-based trend reports and forecasting across five content streams.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Headquarters

HQ city

Eastbourne

HQ country

United Kingdom

HQ region

Europe

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Operations, Others

Revenue model

1. trendhub Subscription: Subscription-based access to the trendhub online community platform providing trend reports, articles, videos, infographics, and interactive maps. Content posted daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, seasonally and annually.
2. E-book Sales: Sale of the 20 Years in Food & Beverage Trends e-book at £24 per copy, with proceeds donated to Chefs in Schools charity
3. Free Community Content: Free access to trend articles, predictions, infographics, videos and events for community members, driving engagement and lead generation

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion2 records

Distribution channels5 records

Marketing channels10 records

Core offering

The Food People is a global food and beverage trends and ideas agency that operates trendhub, an online subscription-based community platform delivering trend intelligence, foresight, and inspiration content. It produces in-depth trend reports, articles, videos, infographics, and interactive maps across five content streams (foodwatching, drinkswatching, healthwatching, menuwatching, categorywatching) that help food manufacturers, beverage brands, retailers, and foodservice operators identify innovation opportunities. The company also runs the Annual Food & Beverage Trend Summit and sells a commemorative 20-year e-book covering food and beverage trends from 2006-2025.

Product overview

The Food People operates trendhub as a unified online platform offering multiple trend content streams including foodwatching, drinkswatching, healthwatching, menuwatching, and categorywatching. The core trendhub platform provides an interactive trend framework that connects trend manifestations to future foresight, delivering content daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, seasonally and annually. Supporting offerings include the TFP Foundation charitable initiative, the Annual Food & Beverage Trend Summit event, an e-book publication covering 20 years of trends, and infographics providing visual trend reports. The company leverages unique IP and methodologies to interpret thousands of data points into actionable trend intelligence.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• trendhub: Online community platform for trend intelligence, providing food and drink trends, foresight and inspiration content including reports, articles, videos, and infographics.
• TFP Foundation
• foodwatching
• drinkswatching
• healthwatching
• menuwatching
• categorywatching

Products and services

• trendhub Subscription-based online community platform that is the essential trends, foresight, and global inspiration resource for food and drink. Provides access to in-depth reports, articles, videos, infographics, and interactive maps on food and beverage trends, with an interactive trend framework connecting today's trend manifestations to tomorrow's foresight horizon.
• foodwatching Trend content stream providing cutting-edge food trend manifestations with real-time content from around the globe. Offers trendhub articles, reports, videos and infographics focused on food trends anchored by region.
• drinkswatching Trend content stream providing cutting-edge beverage trend manifestations across the food and drink spectrum. Offers trend reports and content on drink trends anchored by region.
• healthwatching Trend content stream focused on health and wellness trend manifestations. Provides foresight on health, wellbeing, and environmental trends through trendhub content.
• menuwatching Out-of-home trend foresight service covering café, street, QSR, fast casual and fine dining sectors. Covers ingredients, cuisines, food concepts, seasonality, and cooking methods with trend reports and insights, enabled by the proprietary Menuwatching analytics tool.
• categorywatching Retail category trend foresight service covering categories such as plant-based, free from, snacking, meat, convenience, beers, wines, spirits, frozen, cakes and desserts. Provides trend-inspired innovation insights.
• 20 Years in Food & Beverage Trends E-Book E-book documenting two decades of transformation in food and beverage (2006-2025). Covers defining moments, movements, innovations, influential people, cultural shifts, technologies, regulations, and products that shaped the industry. Sold at £24 per copy with £24 from each sale donated to Chefs in Schools.
• Infographics Free downloadable visual trend reports including Top 10 New and Rising Trends and Top 20 What's Hot reports published annually for multiple regions (UK, USA, Australia) and years going back to 2012.

Quantifiable outcome

• Over £185,000 donated to Chefs in Schools and The Food Foundation since November 2020
• +2 more outcomes

Named customers17 records

Segments6 records

Ideal customer profiles4 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature4 records

Partnerships

Three partnerships are on record, tiered flagship and core.

• Chefs in SchoolsflagshipStrategic or Co-development PartnerPrimary charity partner of the TFP Foundation, working to improve food quality, health and education for children and young people. TFP Foundation donates £24 from every e-book sale directly to Chefs in Schools. The partnership includes fundraising challenges and awareness campaigns, including the 7,723 Mile Challenge in 2022.
• The Food FoundationcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCharity partner working to step change food, health and education for future generations. Since launch, over £185,000 has been donated jointly to Chefs in Schools and The Food Foundation.
• Marcus Rashford MBEcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerIn 2021, partnered with Marcus Rashford MBE and The Food Foundation to support the fight to alleviate child food poverty. Produced a film to raise awareness for the Holiday Activity and Food Programme, contributing to the Chancellor announcing £200m annual funding continuation in October 2021.

Scale indicators6 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Innova Market Insights: Specialist food and beverage innovation trend tracker publishing the annual Top 10 Trends. Direct competitor to TFP's categorywatching and foodwatching streams for product development teams.
• Euromonitor International: Global market research provider with extensive packaged food and beverage industry coverage. Comparable in serving multinational FMCG and retail clients with category and trend intelligence subscriptions.
• Promar International: Food and beverage industry consultancy producing market reports and bespoke research. Comparable in serving UK and global food manufacturers and retailers with category-level insight.
• WGSN: Trend forecasting subscription platform covering food & drink alongside fashion, beauty and interiors. Closely comparable subscription-and-community GTM model serving enterprise consumer brands.
• The Future Laboratory: UK-based trend forecasting agency publishing reports, hosting events and running a subscription platform. Comparable boutique agency model targeting brand innovation teams across consumer categories.
• Mintel: Global market research firm with a dedicated Food & Drink category covering trends, innovation and consumer insight. Most direct comparability with TFP's trendhub offering for enterprise CPG and retail clients.
• Stylus: Cross-category consumer trend forecasting agency publishing insight reports and running events. Comparable in serving consumer brand innovation and marketing teams with paid subscription intelligence.

Broad incumbents

• NielsenIQ: Global consumer intelligence giant combining point-of-sale data, panels and trend reporting. Broader and more established than TFP but addresses the same food and beverage enterprise buyers with overlapping trend content.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat6 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/thefoodpeople
• YouTubeyoutube.com/channel/UCejrXvm93mTPDXsztb8hwbA
• Facebookfacebook.com/pages/thefoodpeople/176122660474
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/thefoodpeople
• Instagraminstagram.com/foodwatching

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles3 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about The Food People