FIS Group is reimagining the future of food and drink
Three businesses consolidated into one powerful specialist insight, innovation and product testing partner for food and drink
Food Innovation Solutions, Good Sense Research and Cambridge Market Research have come together as one business, bringing more than 30 years of food and drink category heritage under a single name.
Still under the same strong ownership and leadership of Kelly Dowson (Group Managing Director) and Mike Faers (Founder and Group CEO), the consultancy offers strongly integrated specialist capabilities globally. Expertise spans trend tracking and product insight, testing excellence, quality benchmarking programmes, culinary excellence, innovation pipeline development and foodservice menu creation.
FIS Group, a specialist insight, innovation and product testing partner for the food and drink industry, has formally launched. Food Innovation Solutions, Good Sense Research and Cambridge Market Research have come together as one business, working as a single team under one name, with one point of access for clients.
The launch brings together established specialist teams with more than 30 years of combined heritage in the food and drink sector. Rather than operating as separate businesses, the group now works as one connected team across insight, innovation and product testing, reflecting how clients already engage across the full range of its expertise.
Why now
The decision is about clarity and strength. As the businesses have grown, so has the way clients work with them, across more services, more specialisms and more connected briefs. A single brand makes that full range easier to understand, easier to access and better connected.
The group is clear that the move was about capability, not scale for its own sake. The founding businesses were brought together for their complementary skills, experience and people, with Good Sense Research and Cambridge Market Research each contributing more than 30 years in the sector. The group works across retail, foodservice, branded FMCG and own label, fresh produce growers and scaling businesses. FIS Group runs large-scale fresh produce benchmarking programmes for the largest food retailers in the UK. The group has also created proprietary insight programmes including Appetite Shift, an ongoing, syndicated study tracking how GLP-1 medications are reshaping consumer diets, habits and lifestyles.
What it means for clients
For clients, the change brings clearer access to the full offer, joined-up thinking across insight, innovation and product, and one connected team to work with. The people, expertise and standards they already know do not change. The group puts the right team on each project, matched to the brief.
From the leadership team
“Pride is the first word I would use. I am immensely proud of our business, our team and our people, and I am excited in equal measure. People ask why we made the acquisitions we did. The honest answer is that we never bought an order book. We bought complementary skills, experience and people. Joined up, that knowledge is the whole point.”
Mike Faers, Founder and Group CEO, FIS Group
“For me, this is about building a simpler, stronger and more connected organisation, easier to understand and better positioned for the future. It brings real benefits to our customers: greater clarity, consistency and confidence, with all of our expertise now accessible through one trusted name.”
Kelly Dowson, Group Managing Director, FIS Group
The vision
FIS Group wants to be the go-to partner for food and drink businesses that need sharp, forward-thinking insight and innovation support. The ambition is to be the people clients call first, because the group understands their world, challenges their thinking and helps them get to better answers faster. It is captured in a single line that now sits at the top of everything the group does: reimagining the future of food and drink.
