Bringing Generation COVID back into the workplace

How corporate caterers can adapt to emerging customer needs.

Anyone in marketing will be used to the terms: persona, Millennial, Gen X, Y and Z. While they might be less familiar to those in other areas of business, their effect can be felt throughout a company. Who a company’s prospective customer personas are, impacts everything, from the food being served, through to the décor and technology in use.

Prior to 2020, most established catering companies will have known their customer personas, their wants and needs. This year, a global pandemic has thrown that knowledge out of the window. When normal, or the ‘new normal’ life resumes, everything businesses thought they knew about their customers will need to be re-examined. Every persona group will have to be considered separately but also together within a new ‘Generation COVID’ persona.

We define Generation COVID as: Anyone within the global population that has suffered medically, financially and/or socially as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. To fully understand this new persona will take time. The pandemic is not over yet and we cannot know what events might force further change within the group. Variations, resulting from age, wealth and education, exist within the group.

QikServe and Kafoodle work closely with operators in all sectors of the food and drink industry, including corporate caterers. In recent months we’ve been observing the evolving Generation COVID persona and have collaborated on a report presenting their unique needs. We’ve gathered industry insight and expertise and compiled essential information for workplace caterers. Designed to help businesses prepare for the return of Generation COVID and implement changes that will build trust, the report is intended support all businesses in welcoming staff back to a workplace with safe, comfortable catering facilities and offering suggestions for future sales drivers.

Further to the release of the report, we will be holding a webinar with guest panellist, Paul Cowie from international facilities management and corporate catering company, OCS – delving into their personal experiences. To top it off, we will use the webinar to present three brand new Generation COVID personas.

The corporate catering industry is facing the toughest trading period of the past few decades. Despite its difficulties, opportunities still exist, and businesses should prepare to take advantage of them as workers return to their offices. If corporate caterers can keep their eyes on the trends influencing this new Generation COVID persona, and if they adopt a problem–solving mindset, they can help bring staff back to the office, and engage successfully with them once there.

To download the report, click here.

To register for the webinar, click here.