Development of an affective sensoric analysis method for application i food industry

Purpose and goal

The purpose of this project was to develop and test a method for integraton of affective paramters in food products. A mapping of state-of-the-art affective product development methods was conducted. Thus with special focus on identification of delighters such as ´wanting´. Based on this step a new method was developed capable to link affective subjective customer needs to concrete product properties. This method was applied in 3 industrial products at Cloetta AB, Lantmännen AB, Espuna Ltd. The results were fed back to the companies and will be published

Results and expected effects

Experiences from developing the new method were continuously fed back into the process which resulted into a number of iterations before implementation. The results from the case studies were given back to the companies. 2 seminars have already taken place (1 Spain, 1 Sweden), at least one more seminar will take place in autumn 2013. The study will be presented as a paper in next years KEER conference with has a stream for food industry. Apart from the final report to VINNOVA about two scientific papers will be submitted.

Approach and implementation

The project was carried out in 5 steps. In the first step a literature review was conducted in order to identify suitable methods. In the end only 2 methods remained which in the second step were combined into one method specific for food products with focus on creation of new attractive products. In the third step this method was applied to three food products. Two of these case studies yielded complete results, while in one case only part results could be retrieved. Based on these experiences the methods was adapted in the 4th step and introduced to industry in the final step.