Membership
Inside Future Food Movement: Your September Update
September 2026
Inside Future Food Movement: Your September Update
What the summer's signals change for your planning, and what we have on this month.
Climate, health, sourcing, policy, consumer demand; issues that used to sit in separate meetings now land on the same desk. Yours.
Appetite is changing, resilience is climbing the agenda, policy is getting louder. The businesses making sense of it fastest are pulling ahead.
This month, we're helping you read the signals: what's moving, what matters, where to focus next.
Kate
This month's thinking
Field Notes: The assumptions are moving
Greggs rebuilding its offer around hotter weather. A fish finger with 30,000 miles inside it. GLP-1s raising what happens to a food economy built to sell more when people start wanting less.
Kate on why these are not separate stories, and on turning the lens around: less about what your business does to the world, more about what the changing world does to your business.
Read the full Field NotesThe Future of Appetite: Where will food growth come from next?
Kate joined Tesco's health roundtable alongside Ashwin Prasad (Tesco UK CEO), Richard Hall (Danone) and dietitian Lucy Upton. What came out of the discussion is that health has stopped being a sustainability or corporate responsibility agenda and started being a commercial growth question. Tesco has moved the healthy share of its food sales from 58% in 2019 to 65% by the end of 2025, which says more about where demand is heading than it does about reformulation.
Add GLP-1s redefining portion size, satiety and value, and the question changes shape entirely: what happens to growth when it is no longer driven by persuading people to eat more? That one sits with commercial, category and innovation teams as much as with health.
Read the article, then join us on the 10thBread & Jam 2026: Why this is the most important two days in the challenger brand calendar
Around 16,000 new food and drink products launch into the UK market every year and roughly nine in ten do not survive the first year of trading. Hattie spent two days at the Business Design Centre, and the advice that kept surfacing across every stage was consistent: prove demand before you get in front of a buyer, find the message that genuinely resonates instead of speaking to everyone, and put the mission ahead of the commercial ask. Useful whether you are building a challenger brand or buying from one.
Read Hattie's write-up
What's coming up
Learn with us: Food Systems Essentials Accelerator | Final places
Starts 9th September · Online · Supported by Provision Trade Federation
Four sessions over four weeks to build the judgement and system view that makes the commercial calls easier when cost, resilience, health and growth pull against each other. £810 per person (ex VAT).
Last chance to sign upSee the months ahead at a glance
Your H2 2026 member calendar is live. Every session, briefing and touchpoint for the rest of the year, in one place.
Bookmark the H2 2026 membership calendarSeptember Expert Event: When Appetite Changes, How Do Brands Grow?
Thursday 10th September · 10-11am · Online
As GLP-1s, reformulation pressure and changing consumer expectations reshape the market, Alice Ritchie (Tesco), Alex Brooks (Field Doctor), Dan Parker (Veg Power), Phil Gowland (Whitworths) and Ben Ebbrell (Sorted Food) look at where the next decade of growth in food actually comes from.
Join via the event link on the dayFarmer-Led Working Group - with Business Members
Tuesday 15th September · 10-11am · Gold and Platinum members
Hear an honest, practical picture of the realities shaping supply, delivery and decision-making.
Talk to us about upgrading to access these sessionsSupport British Regenerative Farming Week
12th to 19th September · Nationwide
A new annual campaign led by RISE Re:Gen, bringing farmers, retailers, manufacturers and supply chain partners around one aim. There are practical ways to mark it, from a farm walk or supplier story to an internal session for your procurement team.
See how to take partMeet the network drinks
Wednesday 16th September · 5.30-8pm · Lucky Saint Pub, London · Members only
Join members for an evening of relaxed drinks and good conversation.
Register your interestStay informed: Signals Intelligence Briefing (Climate Week NYC)
Wednesday 23rd September · 10-11am · Platinum and Catalyst members
Decode the market, consumer, policy and supply chain signals shaping the quarter ahead with founder Kate Cawley.
Upgrade your membership to access the Signals Intelligence BriefingLooking ahead: Future Food Movement Clinic: Making AI Work
Tuesday 20th October · 10-11am · Online · In partnership with Cerve · Silver, Gold and Platinum members
What has to be in place before AI can act on your business information rather than just answer questions about it. Built around real member challenges, in partnership with Cerve.
Speak to us about upgrading to access the clinicHave your say: Contribute to the Good Food Bill
The second consultation with The Food Foundation is open, and it's your chance to make sure policymakers understand what you're actually dealing with.
Complete the surveyWant the full picture? Every session between now and November, with dates and access levels, is on our events page, so you can plan.
Meet the network
Case study: Baking a Sustainable Future, with Warburtons
We worked with Warburtons to turn its responsible business plan into an energising launch, practical champion resources and a toolkit commercial teams now use with customers. The approach is already inspiring a new version for procurement.
“The real opportunity is when responsible business moves beyond strategy documents and becomes part of everyday conversations and decisions,” says Jack Warburton, Responsible Business Strategy Controller, Warburtons.
See the work in action
Strategic partner: Regenerative agriculture won't scale without farmers at the table
Our partnership with Regenagri sits behind the Farmer-Led Working Group, and this piece sets out why the transition stalls when producers are not in the room. Certification and traceability, evidence farmers can actually use rather than another round of data collection, and where the value has to land for a practice change to hold. With Lindsey Crompton, Director of Partnerships and Communications at Regenagri.
Read the article
Meet our newest member: Wildly Tasty
Frozen has spent years carrying a reputation it did not entirely earn, and children's food is where the reappraisal gets tested properly. Louisa Mitchell built Wildly Tasty for 3 to 10 year olds, the group that falls between baby food and adult formats made smaller, at exactly the age eating habits are forming. She took the range through our Food Systems Essentials Accelerator in 2024. She talks here about the gap between how shoppers read frozen in a farm shop and in a supermarket, why cutting SKUs turned out to be the growth strategy, and how she scaled production without loosening sourcing standards.
Read the interview
Welcoming Leyla Pope to the Farmer-Led Working Group
Ask a farmer to invest in soil health and you are asking them to accept a return that may not show up for three, five or ten years. Most of the commercial signals reaching them run on a much shorter clock. Leyla farms in mid Wales and is making new-entrant decisions at today's prices, with today's schemes and none of the inherited habits, which is a large part of why her perspective is useful in the room.
Read the welcomeMembers in the Spotlight
It's been a reporting month across the network: three ESG publications, a new collective working on representation in food and farming, practical AI arriving in the sector, and fresh data on where food prices are heading.
Be inspired by The Compleat Food Group, PepsiCo, Hilton Foods, Culture Roots Collective, Agri-AI, The Food Foundation, the NFU, the British Veterinary Ethnicity and Diversity Society, and Mallika Basu sharing her new project the Hackney School of Food.
What did you miss
Catch up on what you missed
Get practical: Future Food Movement Clinic: Health
Silver, Gold and Platinum members
What is stalling progress on health inside food businesses, and the takeaways to sharpen your strategy.
Speak to us about an upgrade to access the takeaways to sharpen your health strategyUnderstand how power is shaping change: July Expert Event
Hannah Brinsden, Catherine Howarth OBE, Ana Cuddeford and Polly Mackenzie on influence, accountability and leadership across food.
Use the takeaways with your team, or watch the sessionGet strategic: London Climate Action Week: Future-Proofing Food Infrastructure
In partnership with Mitie and Climate X
Climate risk in estates, assets, operations and long-term business continuity, and what to do about it.
Use the briefing for your resilience planningUnderstand what farms are facing: Farmer-Led Working Group
In partnership with Regenagri and Cool Farm
What is being felt on farm right now, and what it means for your sourcing decisions.
Upgrade to access insight that will help with your sourcing decisions
Member library
Everything in this update, and everything from previous months, lives in your Member Library.
Access the Member Library
Part of our network, spread the word
Share that you are part of the Future Food Movement network.
Access the LinkedIn asset
Member reminder
From Direct From The Network intelligence, Founder Field Notes, Strategic Signals briefings, Expert events, Technical deep-dives, Leadership briefings and Cross-sector connections, everything is designed around one objective: helping you make better decisions, faster, by understanding where the food system is heading before it becomes obvious.
Thank you for being part of the movement. See you soon,
Kate and the Future Food Movement team