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STREET FOODS ‘SPIRIT OF SHARING’ SOURED BY COPYCAT CULTURE

Street Food from IWP

 

We always like to keep abreast of the latest trends in food and drink, and ‘Street food’ – artisan food sold on the streets, or anywhere other than restaurants or cafés – has been one of the hottest trends over the last couple of years with between 600 and 700 new street food businesses signing up to the Nationwide Caterers Association in 2014 alone.

Of course, the concept comes from America, where the food truck craze has been steadily growing into a huge industry and many of the UK’s first street food traders were inspired by these food trucks for the food they serve, cooking methods, marketing (especially social media) and to a degree attitude. American street food carved out a reputation for           re-inventing the ‘classics’ by stripping down the dish to its core ingredients and then re-designing it, using improved cooking methods and ingredients.

Street food has always been about sharing, with traders helping each other out and lending equipment to their fellow traders to help them get their stalls set up. Recently however, sharing has become taking and “inspiration” has become plagiarism with some traders making off with other’s intellectual property – and passing off recipes, logos, menus and ideas as their own.

It’s starting to get nasty as Richard Johnson, founder of the British Street Food Awards and author of Street Food Revolution points out in this excellent blog post in The Guardian.

We’re all used to copycat disputes between brands and retailers with their ever-so-similar own label offerings (naming no names), but it’s one thing when big businesses are going head to head and another thing altogether when people’s “ideas, creativity, originality and livelihoods are being stolen by others who lack the imagination to do their own thing”. As Richard says, let’s hope that all the money flooding into the street food movement doesn’t mean that the lawyers end up take over, and more importantly, let’s hope that the industry manages to retain its authenticity and stay true to its roots.

At IWP, we have many years of food and drink industry expertise at local, national and international levels, understanding the ebb and flow of trends and the direct impact of poor design, marketing and advertising on brands.

We know what works.

And just as importantly, we know what doesn’t.