ROSEMONT, IL - “We are hoping to support our customers while meeting the demands of the changing demographics. People don’t change their values from when they eat at home to when they eat out, so it really is about bringing foodservice to the forefront of current trends,” Stacie Sopinka, Vice President of Product Development and Innovation at US Foods, tells me as we discuss the launch of Serve Good.

In an effort to help independent restaurateurs meet this changing consumer demand, the Serve Good line of products offers 21 responsibly sourced items – including produce – that also contribute to waste reduction the benefits of versatility and time and labor savings in the kitchen. According to US Foods more consumers are seeking food that is sustainably produced and sourced. In addition, less than 1/3 of consumers feel that restaurants offer enough clean, sustainable menu options.

Enter the new Serve Good line. This line offers a range of items from produce pickings like Cross Valley Farms® Chopped Broccoli Leaves, one of the latest superfood discoveries, to the company’s Cross Valley Farms® Organic Spring Mix. Broccoli leaves capture more goodness from one plant, minimizes water usage and yields an additional 2,640 pounds of product harvested per acre. The organic spring mix is more cost-efficient, offers superior quality, taste, and year-round availability with the additional perk that the packaging facility for this product is required to clean this spring mix with an organic solution.

Other items include Chef’s Line® All Natural Turkey Breast Roast, Harbor Banks® Barramundi, and Monarch® Eggless Spread, just to name a few.

Amanda Schmid, Sr. Product Developer tells me that the two big trends around food-sourcing, specifically in produce, are waste-reduction and waste-management. Amanda has been with US Foods for about four years, mainly working in the grocery category. Prior to that she worked for the CPG company Sarah Lee on a commercialization team working to nationally launch some of the company’s branded items.

“More and more, consumers want to know that their food is responsibly sourced and they also want to know its impact on the environment,” Amanda says. “The broccoli leaf, which used to be a throwaway part of that piece of produce, is now utilized not only for its flavor, but for its impact on waste reduction. As these new demands from the consumer continue to grow, we also launched our organic spring mix and have seen a lot of success across our customer base. Organic demand is also growing exponentially and is something that consumers are looking for when they are shopping for product. This goes hand-in-hand with the whole clean ingredient movement and trend and we want to stay ahead of the constantly evolving consumer buying behaviors.”

When I ask what it took to bringing bring the Serve Good line from vision to market, Stacie tells me, “We knew that there was an opportunity in sustainable food and sourcing with the evolving consumer food trends. We were waiting for the right point in time for us to enter with sustainable products. That happened when we had built up our innovation pipeline and had the right supplier relationships that would enable us to launch nationally. It also came down to reading the market and ensuring the market was ready.”

Stacie and Amanda both add that sustainable items are not as prevalent in restaurant foodservice yet, relative to retail, so foodservice customers need to realize the importance of sustainability to the consumer. The conversation around sustainability in college and university healthcare has been ongoing for quite some time, Stacie notes, and US Foods’ customers had been repeatedly asking for assistance in finding products, especially on a national scale, since so much was only available regionally.

“It was difficult for a large national customer to find these products,” Stacie says. “It was really the intersection of those two areas that moved this launch forward and the fact that we felt the time was right.”

While the foodservice menu is changing and consumers become more and more aware of the importance behind food sourcing, US Foods looks at this trend as an opportunity. While the line is a form of innovation, it also offers that differentiation and that authentic story that consumers crave.

US Foods