Food product development can take 1-6 months, depending on the product and the complexity of the development.
The timeline is influenced by:
At Thinking Forks, we establish the development roadmap early and identify potential bottlenecks so we can shorten time-to-market without compromising product quality.
Yes, Food consultants help brands reformulate and optimise existing food products to improve their performance, nutrition, cost or consumer appeal.
Depending on the objective, the below are some of the aspects that can be worked on:
Start by understanding what consumers already value about the product and then refine the formulation without compromising its taste, quality or commercial viability.
A product should be designed for scale from the beginning, ensuring that a formulation developed in the lab can perform consistently in commercial production.
During scale-up, the below factors should be evaluates:
Close co-ordination with manufacturing teams helps to identify and resolve issues before full-scale production, helping ensure consistent taste, texture, appearance, quality and performance across batches.
Any product idea is first converted into a clear product brief and formulation, and then rapid prototyping is used to bring it to life.
We start by defining:
Then the R&D team develops bench-scale prototypes, tests them, and iterates the formulation until desired product profile is achieved.
At Thinking Forks, we balance taste, nutrition and cost together from the start, rather than optimising one at the expense of the others.
We typically look at:
This helps us arrive at products that consumers want, businesses can afford to make, and manufacturers can produce consistently.
Consumer insights help us turn what consumers need and want into tangible product attributes.
We use insights to define:
These insights then feed directly into formulation and product development, helping us build products that are consumer-led rather than technology-led.
With the use of sensory evaluation and consumer testing it is determined, how well a product performs will perform with its intended audience.
Depending on the project, this can include:
The feedback helps us identify what is working, what needs to change, and whether the product is ready to move towards commercialisation.
Functionality is built into the product formulation itself, while ensuring the product still delivers on taste, format, cost and consumer appeal.
An ideal approach would consider:
This allows development of science-backed functional foods and beverages where the benefit is part of the product – not simply a marketing claim added later.
Manufacturing feasibility is considered in the F&B product development process from the very beginning, rather than waiting until the product is ready to launch.
The below assessments are carried out:
This helps bridge the gap between lab formulation and commercial production, reducing the risk of costly problems during scale-up.
Shelf life is determined by studying how the product, formulation, packaging and storage conditions perform over time.
Depending on the product, we assess:
Shelf-life studies help establish a commercially practical shelf life while ensuring the product maintains its required quality, safety and performance.
Food product development is de-risked by testing the product at every critical stage before commercialisation.
Evaluate the below:
The idea is simple: identify and solve problems in the development stage, rather than after the product reaches the market.
We design products with multi-market requirements in mind from the start as per the client brief, so the same product concept can be adapted for different regions without having to restart the development process.
Our teams consider:
This approach helps brands develop once, adapt intelligently, and scale across markets while managing regulatory and technical risks.
Write to us at hello@thinkingforks.com
Let’s build what matters.
