“Booming” Trends in Healthcare & Foodservices

on July 12, 2011 at 11:05 am

How do you imagine healthcare food services changing in a few years from now? Who will have control? What will the new trends be? As we know it, the future of healthcare food services lies in the hands of the baby boomer generation. What they eat, when they eat, and where they eat seem to be the factors that may matter the most when it comes to their culinary experience.

A baby boomer is categorized as a person born after World War II (approximately between the years 1946 -1964. The baby boomer generation is described as being confident, independent, self-reliant, achievement-oriented, career-focused and well-established. In the next decade, it is predicted that approximately 80 million baby boomers will retire, which equates to 8, 000 employees retiring per day, or 300 per hour.

Baby boomers are considered to be very work-centric; they have high work ethic and are motivated by prestige. They worked extremely hard to succeed and believe that their progeny should pay their dues and pave their own road of accomplishments. Due to living through reform, Baby boomers believe they can change the world and always question authority and challenge the status quo.

With their reformist attitude and bold confidence, baby boomers will inevitably change the world of retirement; but how? It’s hard to predict. Whether this means hiring private help and aging in place, or choosing a retirement home to live in, baby boomers will revolutionize aspects of the healthcare system.

When seniors consider continuous care facilities or retirement communities, one of the first and most important questions they ask is “how is the food?” The culinary experience plays a crucial role in choosing the best care facility for the baby boomer. This generation is also very knowledgeable about nutrition with many of them eating local and/or organic foods, reading labels, and being very conscious and mindful of what they consume. Food quality and choice will play a huge factor in choosing a retirement/nursing home for this generation.

A trend analysis conducted by Nestle investigated the culinary experiences of the baby boomer generation and offer food industry tips to help cater to this population. Baby boomers were shown to enjoy more peaceful, quieter eating environments with professional yet relaxed service. They look for healthy choices, organic/natural foods, and ethnic ingredients and menu options. They prefer familiar dishes, but like them presented in different ways. They enjoy smaller serving sizes, but if that is not an option, they tend to share entrees. Subtle lighting is preferred, and an extensive wine list is key! Finally, in terms of food packaging, they prefer packaging that is easy to manipulate for their aging hand.

With a plethora of food and cooking shows on TV, celebrity chefs, and traveling experiences, baby boomers want exciting food. But how can healthcare food services provide this? Having main dining rooms in a facility along with small cafes, bistros, ice cream parlors, coffee shops, and restaurants, can create a perception of a community within a facility. Residents will be able to assert and maintain their independence and free will by choosing where they want to dine, when they want to eat, and what they want to eat within the facility. Additionally, inviting a chef from culinary school to cook for and in front of the residents (similar to a cooking show) can provide an exciting experience. The overall experience can be thought of as a cruise ship on land.

This leads me to my next point. Can cruise ships actually become the next assisted living facility? With the baby boomer population being healthier overall for a longer period of time, it may become a popular trend for people to retire on cruise ships. It is quite possible for those people who are cognitively functioning and needing some assistance in daily living to turn toward cruise ships which offer many amenities: 3 meals per day as well as snacks, entertainment, room service, housekeeping and laundry services, and physicians on board. This would be quite a luxurious assisted living facility, especially for those who love to travel.

Living on a cruise ship is actually cost-effective and feasible. According to an article on FuturePundit, Lindquist, a physician, compared the expenses over a 20 year life expectancy between an assisted living facility and a cruise ship (with medical costs included) – she found that living on a cruise ship costs only around $2000 more than an assisted living facility over a 20 year period. This equates to around $230,000 over 20 years, or approximately 33,000 per year for a cruise ship, vs. $228,000 over 20 years or on average $28,000 per year in an assisted living facility. In addition to this, a higher quality of life may be experienced on a cruise ship, which isn’t hard to believe considering how luxurious cruise ships are today.

Why are the costs between cruise ships and assisted living facilities so comparable? Assisted living facilities such as nursing homes are not in a competitive market as are cruise ships. Cruise ships have to offer competitive prices to ensure filling their cabins with the high turnover trips. Therefore, this is a very feasible option for the baby boomer generation who love to travel, are healthier for longer, and have the funds available for more luxurious assisted living. The number of people that will opt for this option instead of a traditional assisted living facility is debatable. What is known is that baby boomers want something “different,” something other than what their parents experienced.

So, what trends can we expect for healthcare systems and food services in the future? It’s hard to say. With the baby boomers next in line for retirement, it is pretty certain that those who opt for an assisted living facility will demand quality food and service. Others may prefer a different way of retiring such as cruising their way through the aging process unless advanced medical assistance is needed. For others, they may age in place at home and hire private help (i.e. nurses, meals on wheels, private chefs etc) to help with activities of daily living. Either way, I predict that the baby boomers will revolutionize the health care system and have a huge influence on the future direction of food services. One thing is for sure – baby boomers will not be mainstream.