Restaurants, chefs and local foods: insights drawn from application of a diffusion of innovation framework

Abstract

Chefs have been recognized as potentially important partners in efforts to promote local food systems. Drawing on the diffusion of innovation framework we (a) examine the characteristics of chefs and restaurants that have adopted local foods; (b) identified local food attributes valued by restaurants; (c) examine how restaurants function as opinion leaders promoting local foods; (d) explored network linkages between culinary and production organizations; and (e) finally, we consider some of the barriers to more widespread adoption of local foods in the culinary community. Analyzing quantitative and qualitative data collected from interviews with individuals from 71 restaurants, we compare and contrast restaurants that utilize relatively large amounts of locally-produced ingredients with restaurants using few, if any, local products. Results reveal that chefs are most interested in intrinsic food qualities, such as taste and freshness, and less interested in production standards. As opinion leaders, chefs utilize signage, wait staff, and cooking classes to promote local foods; however, the diffusion process across restaurants, and between restaurants and producers, is limited by network associations. Structural barriers such as distribution problems and lack of convenience were identified as limiting more widespread use of locally-grown foods. We offer several implications of this research for further work that seeks to engage chefs as opinion leaders who are important to building greater support for local food systems.

Irish Chefs and Restaurants in the Geography of “Local” Food Value Chains

“…Chefs 4 and 5 reported purchasing vegetables from reliable wholesale suppliers, whom they trusted to provide them with local food when possible, rather than directly from the producers. This approach reduces the number of contacts that must be maintained and increases convenience and coincides with evidence from other countries (e.g., [9]). Meat was usually sourced from local family butchers.…”

“…While the produce purchased by an individual chef will usually only form part of a producer's sales, chefs are known to play an important role as taste makers among other chefs and among the public more generally [9]. Examples exist like Alice Waters, who established Chez Panisse in Berkeley, California, in 1971 [10], and Myrtle Allen of Ballymaloe House in Ireland [11] whose influence is recognized as having been far-reaching.…”

“…Restaurants have not been neglected in studies of food by geographers, sociologists, and cultural historians [9,[12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19]. However, local food has received relatively limited attention in studies of restaurants, and specifically the role of chefs in *Address correspondence to this author at the Department of Geography & Environmental Resources, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, Illinois 62901, USA; Tel: + 618.453.6084; E-mail: duram@siu.edu the local food chain is under explored.…”

Commercial Bakers' View on the Meaning of "Local" Wheat and Flour in Western Washington State

“…Reestablishment of what Hergesheimer and Wittman (2012) refer to as "place-based grain systems" in locations that historically grew their own grain has the potential to increase crop diversity and improve farm profitability, resulting in the preservation of farmland. The barriers related to lack of infrastructure and cost-effective processing and distribution pose challenges for the development of local grain supply chains, much as they have for local food supply chains as identified by Starr et al (2003), Inwood et al (2009), andVogt andKaiser (2008). As with other types of food, economies of scale in a local grain system can be difficult to achieve without the product volumes to access the mainstream supply chain.…”

“…Starr, Card, Bnepe, Auld, Lamm, Smith, and Wilken (2003) examine the connections between local (produce) farmers and restaurants and institutions in Colorado. Inwood, Sharp, Moore, and Stinner (2009) look at the characteristics of early adopters, motivations for using local foods, and barriers to adoption of local food use by Ohio chefs. Vogt and Kaiser (2008) found in their review of 19 studies of farm-to-institution and farm-to-school linkages that institutional support was needed to transition to this method of purchasing.…”