A new Bramble Intelligence report, Tomorrow’s Appetites, identifies three consumer tools developing fast enough to make traditional growth playbooks “less relevant and reliable.” None acts in isolation, and their interaction is precisely where commercial advantage will be won or lost over the next decade.
GLP-1 Drugs Reach Beyond the Patient
Bramble estimates a quarter of UK adults will be using appetite-suppressing drugs regularly by 2035, with adoption outpacing statins. Oral formats and next-generation compounds with fewer side effects will accelerate uptake, as will expanding approved conditions.
The household ripple effect is where food brands should look hardest. The GLP-1 patient base skews heavily toward women aged 30 to 49 — often the primary household shopper. Early evidence shows that when one person starts the drugs, partners and children begin eating differently too. By 2035, Bramble projects 15 to 20 million UK adults will be influenced by the drugs without ever taking them.
The spending math is striking. Calorie intake for GLP-1 users falls roughly 25% in the first year, yet grocery spend drops only about 5% as baskets shift toward protein and fresh foods. Discretionary, high-margin categories — snacks, desserts, bakery, alcohol — face the sharpest exposure.
Signs are already visible. Fifteen of the top 20 cereal brands are losing volume, while gut-health challenger Bio&Me is up 40%. At Pret A Manger, salads are growing three times faster than sandwiches.
AI Grocery Shopping Becomes Mainstream
As consumers demand clearer answers about what to eat, AI is where they turn to cut through contradictory advice. Over a third of UK and US online grocery shoppers have used AI to assist with shopping in the past six months, according to the report.
The pace of capability is staggering. Three months ago, uploading blood results, dietary preferences, medication restrictions, budget and health goals to an AI agent that then completes your online grocery order was not possible. Today it is. In the first five months of 2026, the four largest AI labs launched consumer-facing health products promising integration of medical records and wearables.
Brands must now optimise for visibility to AI making recommendations — not just to human shoppers. Walmart’s AI assistant Sparky offers a glimpse of the upside: users average 35% higher order values than non-users.
Agentic shopping, where an AI learns preferences and places orders autonomously, is in early deployment. Bramble warns the technology will mature unevenly and disappoint consumers before it saves them meaningful time and money.
At-Home Diagnostics: The Slowest Wave
Continuous glucose monitors, gut-health tests and other at-home diagnostics give consumers unprecedented visibility into how their bodies respond to specific foods. The tools remain imperfect and largely the preserve of the affluent, but prices are falling.
This will be the slowest of the three tools to reach the mainstream, the report notes. But the group most likely to pull it into wider use is GLP-1 users themselves — highly motivated to sustain weight loss. Diagnostics could do for food what wearables did for fitness.
What Happens Next
The future is not bleak for food and beverage companies that adapt. Bramble identifies four growth lanes: making it easy to eat well, food that genuinely nourishes, ingredients grown and processed in ways consumers can trust, and building a diet-health feedback loop that links purchases, diets and biomarkers to outcomes.
Consumers may even spend more on food than today, paying premiums for what they value. Convenience and price defined the last decade of food retail. Health and wellbeing will define the next.
Chris Mitchell, managing partner at Bramble Intelligence, will present the findings at Future Food Tech London on 24-25 September 2026 — a date food strategists should circle as the industry’s new playbook takes shape.
— Isabella Morales, food desk, AXO News