Crunched, munched and delivered fresh: Big data for the food industry

February 28, 2013

Photo taken from foodtechconnect.com

Big data.

One of the biggest buzz words in marketing and one of the most effective ways to analyze consumer and commercial behavior.

The question in today’s business world isn’t whether we can gather a large amount of information, but how we present it and what we do with it afterward.

The new buzz word: Instantaneous marketing. And luckily for the restaurant world, big data and the food industry are on it.

Food Genius–once a simple restaurant finder tool for foodies–transformed itself into the analyzer of all big data for the United States food industry. Food Genius has grown up to be a data-driven restaurant menu trends machine. Food baby turned food monster. In a good way.

The best part? You choose what you want to know about, input your specifics into the site and they collect all the data and analyze it for you–instantly.

Want to find out about quinoa? Food Genius tells you who is serving it, how many restaurants (and regions) are using it and what dishes are utilizing the ingredient.

Information includes everything from menu pricing to consumer behavior to which chef is using what ingredients where and, in spite of the many calculations needed for accurate statistics, the information is presented in a clean and precise manner.

It’s big data made user-friendly. Crunching numbers, skipping the spreadsheet and going right into presentation mode. The best of both worlds.

Does it come with a price? Yes… and it’s not exactly cheap (as low as $2,000 a month,) but considering how restaurants can instantly use the site as a research and marketing tool, it might be worth shelling out the extra dough.

Just some food for thought. (Yes… I went there.)

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