Consumer appetite for eco-friendly products and recyclable packaging has been growing for years. B-Corp popularity and its impact on brand awareness is skyrocketing: over half of all Millennials and Gen Z Americans report B-Corp familiarity, and one third of US adults report recommending a product specifically because of its B-Corp certification. 

Pressures to evidence sustainable supply chains will see brands ramp up innovation into refillable and biodegradable as well as recyclable packaging. Food and beverage giants such as Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Unilever, Danone and Mondelēz have all set ambitions for and are working towards recyclable/compostable bottles, cans, cartons and boxes.  

Three in four food and beverage companies now rate sustainability as one of their top three business priorities for 2025 and beyond, matching self-reported consumer demand for more sustainable product choices: 

• 78% of shoppers believe sustainability is an important factor in buying choice 

• 66% of US consumers report that they are willing to pay more for sustainable products, especially in plant-based and organic categories 

• 55% of consumers claim that they are willing to spend more on eco-friendly brands. 

However, self-reported consumer attitudes are drifting further away from real-life purchasing decisions: 

• Sustainable products are growing but still represent only one fifth of the CPG market as a whole, as reported by USwitch 

• Zalando’s 2025 Sustainability Attitude Behavior Gap Report found that whilst 74% of fashion consumers aspire to make more sustainable clothing choices, more than one third of these consumers are not taking sustainability into account in their actual purchase decisions 

• More than 4 in 10 consumers in Zalando’s report named unaffordable pricing as their main barrier to purchasing sustainably  

• YouGov’s 2024 study highlighted the other major factors driving the attitude/behavior gap: convenience, product availability and confusion over eco-labeling.  

For insights and media teams, tracking this disconnect is key to understanding how sustainability perceptions shape brand preference and campaign performance. 

Whilst becoming ever more aware of environmental concerns, consumers are simultaneously distancing their personal ideologies from their actual buying behaviors.  The attitude/behavior gap is even wider where consumers face a conflict between their values; often cost, availability or speed of delivery represent higher stakes than personal ethics. 

Purely assessing attitudes and opinions may not accurately reflect how consumers actually interact with a product, and may miss business-critical insights into key purchase drivers. 

“Consumers are far from predictable,” says Delineate Founder and CEO JT Turner. “Brands need to continuously analyze both their preferences and their real behaviors to get the full 360° view. The best consumer data comes directly from consumers themselves: real research with real people has no substitute.” 

Well-designed research is vital to understanding the complex and fast-changing needs of consumers. With participation rates languishing at around 5%, brands have the opportunity to revolutionize their consumer surveys and transform data quality and accuracy. Interactive survey methods, such as gamification, ensure relevance to target audiences and create more realistic conversational experiences to maintain engagement throughout research studies.  

Together, these shifts show how sustainability perception and purchase reality often diverge, a gap data-driven CPG teams must learn to bridge quickly. 

Direct-to-consumer channels across sectors are predicted to generate 50% of overall CPG revenue by 2026, presenting unprecedented growth opportunities for CPG brands. Over half of business leaders anticipate DTC to represent more than a quarter of total sales, almost doubling from 29% last year.  

The CPG innovators of 2026 will not simply sell through DTC channels but will harness emerging technologies to co-create products and personalized experiences with consumers globally.   

General Mills is leveraging DTC channels to capitalize on consumers’ love of nostalgia with digital brand experiences for fans of legacy products like Lucky Charms. The cereal leader involves audiences in testing new products focused around nostalgia, from messaging to flavor variations. Audience feedback is incorporated into DTC strategies for both established and incubator brands, using DTC to successfully launch new campaigns and products.  

“DTC is the fastest way to get our products in front of consumers and generate real-life feedback. We want to fulfil nostalgia-evoking items and provide our fans with the actual products they demand in an interesting way.” 

— Carter Jensen, Senior Manager of Global Ecommerce, General Mills 

• Deeper Consumer Understanding Through Harnessing First-Party Data – Consumers generate trillions of data points per day across social media channels globally, but much is gatekept by the platforms themselves. CMI teams are increasingly using DTC to capture rich first-party data directly from consumers, to personalize campaigns and experiences without depending on retail partners. 

• Data Connectivity – Hyper-personalized consumer journeys require consistent experiences across digital and offline channels. CMI teams are increasingly strategizing to effectively integrate separate data streams across online, in-store and customer service channels to build the full consumer view and deliver superior experiences. 

• Faster Decision-Making – Owned and readily accessible DTC data enables faster analysis and faster recommendations, facilitating faster stakeholder decision-making in response to upcoming trends. DTC insights are empowering agile campaign and product testing, iteration and scaling. 

Even brands rich in first-party data still need brand tracking to see the bigger picture. DTC data shows what’s happening inside your own ecosystem, but brand tracking connects it to what’s happening in the wider market, revealing shifts in awareness, preference and perception beyond your customer base. 

Private and own store labels are continuing to outpace traditional brands as cash-strapped consumers look for value for money without sacrificing quality: 

• The Kerry Group’s The Rise of Private Brands and Shifting Consumer Trends Report reveals that 70% of consumers have experimented with private label products 

• Over 50% of global consumers are increasing their purchase of private-label products 

• Private labels now account for almost one fifth of all consumer spending in the US CPG market 

• Private label products now dominate nearly 60% of UK supermarket sales 

• American dollar sales of private-label goods have surged by over a third since 2019. 

US retailer Target has launched more than 40 private brands across categories by leveraging consumer data and research to align product development and messaging with consumer preferences. Machine learning powers insights to craft distinctive packaging, flavors and campaigns that strike the right balance between quality and value, to position private label brands as strong competitors to well-established household names. 

Walmart also launched its own private label food brand, of which sales growth has been driven by Gen Z consumers. Scott Morris, Senior VP of Private Brands, Food and Consumables at Walmart describes private label line Bettergoods as “a new elevated experience that delivers quality, unique, chef-inspired food at an incredible value.”  

John Furner, CEO of Walmart US reveals, “We see many consumers switching to private brands. Consumers are trading brand names for lower prices across categories like deli, lunch meat, bacon and dairy.” 

• Rethinking Loyalty and Brand Strategy – The traditional brand loyalty dynamic is weakening as consumers become more open to switching brands in return for lower prices. CMI teams are monitoring shifts in trust and preferences, and comparing against competitors, with always-on tracking data. Real-time responses to brand and campaign activities help reveal when consumers are trading down for functional value versus when brand equity still holds its ground, guiding decisions on messaging, pricing, and innovation. 

• More Metrics to Navigate – Focus on product quality and messaging transparency will deliver more data points across convenience, pricing, value expectations. As private labels build trust, CMI teams need brand tracking to isolate what drives preference shifts (functional benefits or brand meaning) and to refine communication strategies accordingly. This ensures insights stay focused on real differentiation, not just parity with private label trends. 

• New Data Collection & Analysis Needs – With most private labels sitting under retailer-controlled brands, insights leaders are collaborating more closely with retail partners. Partnerships must be strengthened to get through the walled gardens of RMNs to access preference and behavioral data, and jointly innovate in both product development and marketing. 

2026 and beyond will see AI deeply integrated across the entire CPG value chain, transforming product development, retail execution and consumer engagement. Combining ML-powered image recognition with behavioral analytics will visualize how consumers interact with products on the shelf, enabling tailored marketing and merchandising. GenAI will increasingly identify unrecognized fears and hidden needs, and help CMI teams and marketers deliver immersive AR/VR experiences and hyper-personalized campaigns in response, boosting revenue by up to 20%. Effective AI usage yields 3-4 times better ROI on personalized consumer engagement campaigns. 

Coca-Cola is already using AI-driven data from its Freestyle and smart vending machines to capture real-time consumer flavor preferences. A continuous feedback loop informs product development cycles, with machine learning models simulating ingredient blends and taste profiles, accelerating experimentation and reducing product innovation costs. Coca-Cola is leveraging AI-driven design techniques to align packaging with futuristic themes and sustainability goals, further enhancing the consumer experience and building brand associations.

However, whilst many CMI teams are using AI to automate repetitive tasks, few are maximizing its capabilities for strategic use. The World Federation of Advertisers reports that just 3% of insights teams have fully embedded AI in their ways of working. The insights teams of 2026 must quickly develop the ability not just to deploy emerging technologies in campaign experimentation and product innovation testing, but cultivate a broad range of skills including: 

• Meaningfully analyzing large, real-time consumer data sets to predict future behaviors 

• Storytelling to translate complex data into actionable narratives for stakeholders 

• Understanding of behavioral science and subconscious purchase drivers to uncover deeper motivations beyond self-reported preferences 

• Agile and iterative research approaches to integrate continuous consumer feedback into marketing strategies 

• Cross-functional collaboration to embed consumer insights seamlessly into business decisions 

Nomad Foods’ Consumer Insights & Analytics Director Alex Hardy shares, “A breadth of experiences and skills are vital within any insights team. Whilst more technical and specialist roles are focused on market mix modeling and how we get the most out of our media effectiveness, I believe that if you get too specialized in one part of insights, it becomes quite a narrow path.  

“In the coming years, CMI teams will need a mix of both generalist and specialist technical roles. My team needs to be proficient in all areas of insights, from market performance to consumer closeness, to innovation and brand equity. I’m very supportive of people moving across the team, developing different skills and having different strengths to their bows.”  

Delineate tracks consumer data across 100 global markets, integrating brand and campaign data sources for fast, accurate insights. We partner the world’s most valuable CPG brands with data on demand, delivered in the format and frequency required by business needs, to reveal the live and long-term impact of brand and campaigns on consumer behavior.  

We help teams speak the same measurement language so decisions can be made with confidence and speed. 

Uncover hidden consumer insights with Delineate’s always-on tracking data.