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Jun 2011 min read

Dining Redefined: Stories from the Future

Updated: Oct 16



Discover how the future of social dining is transforming through innovative spaces and cultural shifts. We share real-world stories that preview what dining out might look like in the coming years. From libraries transforming into communal hubs to innovative drive-in diners with charging stations, we delve into how these spaces might evolve. We also discuss the global implications of coffee's potential extinction on café culture. This episode invites anyone interested in the intersection of food, community, and innovation to imagine new possibilities in everyday dining. Join us to discover how these shifts might redefine the way we gather, eat, and connect in our communities.





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Episode Transcript:

This transcript was computer-generated and human-edited and might contain errors. 


Raakhee: Welcome to Signal Shift by Horizon Shift Lab. We’re your hosts, Lana Price, Raakhee Natha and Sue Chi. Each episode, we explore the latest signals -- in technology, culture, and society-- uncovering insights that will impact our daily lives in the future. Join us as we shift perspectives, explore possibilities, and delve into real changes in our world. Curious to learn more - go to horizonshiftlab.com.


It's fair to say we all love food; who doesn't? But we are probably far more interested in the future of food than the average person, from food systems to what happens with our relationship to food when we have weight loss in a pill. So, big questions and an interesting question is: What happens to restaurants? We see so many of them struggling in our communities, especially since Covid, but we also see many new ones and new concepts and new places coming up as well. So today, we are talking about the future of restaurants. And with that, who wants to get us started off today?


Sue: I can go. This is definitely an exciting topic just to see what the possibility is. And so the signal I found was around what the Surgeon General had said about this epidemic of loneliness, and I know we've touched on loneliness as a topic before. So, the signal I found was basically: What's the next “third place”? If you think of a gathering spot outside of your home, those places have really gone away. And so what's left is really restaurants, but they're not accessible to everyone. 


So, I was thinking, where is the next restaurant going to be, and I found this article that talked about this case to be made that libraries need to have restaurants and cafes. And so, they actually said it's been a global trend in other cities that libraries now have restaurants and some of them are very good. That actually, instead of going to a library to get books, now you want to get that really good coffee, or I think someone had Indonesian food being served in a Paris Library, and just different takes on what food looks like in the library now. So, it's going away from that kind of culture of don't talk, don’t eat, don’t drink in the library to please come talk, eat, and drink at the library. 


In the United States, it hasn't really gotten there yet. But there are a few libraries that are starting to experiment with adding on essentially a restaurant which they'll partner with local restaurateurs, or they'll try to open their own cafe, and it's driven more traffic to the library. It's increased their funding because of some of the revenue sharing that they have with the restaurants and they also offer a combination of food stamps plus additional pricing to make it more accessible to everyone. 

And so, I thought of the library as one place where people of all walks of life gather for different reasons, but they're all there in this physical space. How can you actually get them to continue to gather and maybe start talking to each other? And there was this quote that I really liked from the article. It said, 


“Libraries have always been a proverbial watering hole for the mind. Why not be able to fuel our bodies and linger at the oasis a little longer?” 

So, I was thinking in the future there might be a concept that libraries will now also have additional restaurants and gathering spots for people of all walks of life to hopefully socialize.


Raakhee: I love that, Sue, that's amazing. It's such a beautiful concept. Yeah, it sparked my thinking about how we all volunteered at some place typically like a library when we bring up volunteering, which is often associated with the library. And you spoke about food stamps, and I thought what a beautiful way to give people help and also create a sense of community.


Lana: I love that idea too. I mean, I go to my public library a lot, twice a week sometimes, but I'm really in and out. I reserve my book, I get it, and I go, and then I drop it off. And so I love the idea of lingering but also really questioning a long-held norm. I think when you first said that -- I was like, “What? You can't eat in the library!” There's some deeply held belief in there, and so to just turn that on its head and you can, like it's allowed. And then adding the volunteering, I think that's just, what a beautiful way to take that idea even further. I also volunteered in the library when I was young. It's not only for all walks of life but all ages. And so, I think that's another really great aspect about libraries. Beautiful signal.


Sue: I'll see you all at the library for dinner.


Raakhee: Yes! And we can have great conversations about what we’re reading, what we’re learning.


Sue: That's right.


[05:38]


Raakhee: Very very cool. I’ll jump to my signal.

Mine's a little bit different but similar in the sense of this idea of lifestyle restaurants. And the fact that I think yours spoke really beautifully to loneliness and catering for that. Then, there was another factor that's come out around restaurants, and that's around convenience. 


I think Deloitte did a study on the future of restaurants and they came up with three key trends, and convenience was the top still. So whatever it is, people—it's like grocery delivery—it's like more and more people are going to do it less.


And the signal is: Elon Musk is creating a drive-in diner and charging station in LA for Teslas. Really, of course, around the branding, creating a community and all of that, but it's interesting because I was like, yeah, why it's going to work is -- it does take a bit to charge your car. So that's awesome because you park it, you go watch your movie, you get your food there—and the thing they don't have, but assuming they will, is getting your groceries delivered, right? And so if you can just pop your trunk from your seat while you're watching movies, because somebody on the app is like “Hey, I'm at your car.” Cool, pop your groceries in, close it, and who isn't going to do that? So, I think that sort of concept, I think there's going to be this evolution, around food spaces really being integrated with other activities like that. And I think that's also a possibility for restaurants in the future and what that'll be like. 


Sue: Is he doing an old-school drive-in theater where people come out on roller skates and give you your food and all of those things?


Raakhee: From the preliminary images, I don't know if that's his vision or they’re just using these images, but it looks really interesting, like old school. But if you think about architecture and designing the era with the lines and stuff, there's something a little futuristic-spacey, think Back to the Future vibes, and it's giving those kinds of vibes. I don't think it'll be roller skates, but it takes you back, but it also is spacey and futuristic. It’s very interesting.


Lana: You're right. It does both look like an old-school diner aesthetic and at the same time somehow is futuristic. I don't know how they do that. Yeah, it's interesting that our obsession with productivity and multitasking just—and I think it's funny, Raakhee, that you added on. Like, why not? Let's just get our groceries too, over there. How many things can we possibly do in exactly the same window of time? We're charging the car, watching a movie, we're eating our food, and we're getting our groceries. And so there's something like yes, I think that is a demand that people have. They feel they don't have enough time. So they want something that will speak to that feeling. But that's so counter to, I guess, other cultures where they're just about enjoying the food and that's enough right? It's just savoring every taste and being in good company and nice ambiance. So yeah, I think that's a really interesting evolution in one direction.


Sue: I wonder if that means malls will come back in a different way. If you think about a place that has plenty of parking spots to install new chargers, and then can reimagine the retail space for things that families would need to get done, either through delivery to their car or to a physical place. So if there's daycare or some kind of children's activities within that, some kind of educational learning space, health space, right, just different kind of things you can't necessarily do at home and get them all together. Maybe that's what the reimagined space could be for malls in different places.


[9:50]


Lana: I love that as a potential topic, like one that we can explore possibilities of. What is the future of the mall or shopping? Who knows if we could have foreseen online shopping, right? And now that's just the norm, and so what is the next iteration of that?


I think a while back there were a lot of stories about lab-grown meat, but this was the story about lab-grown coffee, and this biotech startup called Pluri that's venturing into the coffee industry with lab-grown arabica coffee, which is one of the most popular strains of coffee. And what I learned is that there's a risk of coffee going extinct by 2050. This is to me on the level of a crisis for my personal life.


But there are studies that came out in Science magazine that said up to 60% of wild coffee species could go extinct by 2050, including the two most common varieties, which are arabica and robusta, which is what most of the world drinks. And so when I started thinking about a future where we have less access to coffee, I’m really thinking about coffee culture, cafe culture around the world. And if you think about everything from Italy, the home of espresso and the cafe culture there, to Sweden. They have the fika, just their sort of coffee breaks, and in the US we have what's called third wave, very artisanal coffee culture, and Japan they have kind of quirky cafes, and so all around the world people drink coffee. And what would that look like for cafes? And then I started researching if I can freeze beans, how long it will last. I can just start stocking up.


But yeah, I found a couple of different related signals, but I think it's a really intriguing idea of something that maybe we take for granted in our lives, and we use to sustain ourselves. And just thinking about other popular caffeinated drinks, but really a lot of it is about ritual, right, and it's about community, and it's what it symbolizes when you're getting together for a coffee as much as about the drink itself. And so I just thought that was an interesting question and something to imagine what these different possibilities could look like.


Sue: You're taking it from the cultural standpoint, which is absolutely critical. And again, the cafe is another “third place”, right? And so if you start seeing the close of cafes, what's left? That would be really sad and disappointing. I'm also just thinking of the caffeine that I need every day to kind of get through. What would I do without it? I mean, I tried tea, I tried matcha, it just doesn't do it as much as coffee does.


Raakhee: Are they getting successful with this lab coffee? Do the early signs show success in terms of taste?


Lana: I don't know. It seems very preliminary, but the big factors for coffee production are first and foremost climate change. But it's also because there’s coffee production: you can either grow it in the sun versus in the shade. And the shade is a more sustainable form, but sun-grown coffee has been what we've used to expand the coffee business and then that also depletes the soil. I mean, there's a whole kind of thing around it, but I think long story short, it sounds like it's not sustainable.


[14:22]


Sue: I just tried to look up what astronauts do to drink coffee. Is it possible? And they said there's a company in New York called Death Wish Coffee that has sent it into space to see if it’s drinkable for astronauts, so pending.


Lana: Yeah, no, the prepper in me definitely got activated by the story. Let's prepare now.


Raakhee: What it is for me is cacao, which is also endangered, and I will die. I'm giving up chocolate in its refined form, but I have to have cacao with however I'm having it, and I literally will not make it. And I know it's also at risk. I don't know the stats and figures, something to look into, but if you see how my heart is like—it's gonna be, ok, very scary.


Yeah, I think just kind of capping out today: What are you left with? As you ponder the future of restaurants and maybe something really personal?

I think I'm inspired, a little fearful of the loss of coffee and cacao, but I think inspired. Because we are still coming together. We're not losing that. And we're rethinking norms like you said, Lana, right, Sue, with the library. I mean, rethinking ways of doing things. So I think I'm inspired about the future of restaurants in terms of what it means for us as people.


Lana: Yeah, I think what's interesting is that we all took a social lens to restaurants and so well, partially not just the way that we get food. But what are the other purposes of it? And so yeah, I think just knowing that community and getting together with others over a meal has always been and will always be important. And so yes, I share that sort of optimism of how that can continue to evolve.


Sue: Yeah, and I'll just share that. I'm really excited for maybe restaurants kind of vertical gardens or vertical spaces now growing your own food, doing groceries all there so you can see the food at the same time. There might be some kind of a new normal around essentially like futuristic gardening, growing food, growing produce that you can see all at the same time, which will in and of itself is a totally different kind of experience. So that could be really exciting too. But yeah, Raakhee, you're right. Just seeing the whole landscape change is exciting.


Raakhee: I love this Sue, what an awesome vision to close up on. That's really cool. So I love that. So yeah. Thank you so much for listening as always, and we want to hear what you think about this topic and how you feel about the future of restaurants. So, please feel free to leave us your comments. We really love to hear from you. So we will catch you again on the next episode. Thank you so much, and from all three of us for now. Bye.


[17:50]

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3 Comments

Guest
Oct 03

A library in Mount Vernon,WA is going to open later this month and they will have a community kitchen!

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horizonshiftlab
horizonshiftlab
Oct 14
Replying to

Nothing excites us more than seeing the positive and uplifting signals we talk about, happening real-time in the communities around us. Thanks for sharing this, we appreciate it.

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