The Jobs To Be Done (JTBD) framework is a way of understanding consumer behavior by focusing on the goals people are trying to accomplish – or the “jobs” they are hiring a product or service to do. In food and beverage, this goes beyond what consumers buy and looks at why they’re making those choices during specific moments in their day.

Imagine someone picking up a snack bar at 3:00 PM. They’re not just buying calories. They might be “hiring” that product to help them push through the workday without losing focus. Another person might “hire” a smoothie in the morning to simplify breakfast while getting nutrients on the go. JTBD uncovers these functional, emotional, and social drivers that fuel food decisions.

Why JTBD is relevant for food brand strategy

For food marketers and product teams, the Jobs To Be Done lens offers uniquely valuable insight. Rather than simply categorizing products by type – like cereal, yogurt, or chips – it encourages teams to explore

• What problem the consumer is trying to solve
• What context influences their choice (time of day, energy level, location)
• What’s currently not working about their existing options

This approach opens new opportunities for food innovation by reframing the challenge. You’re not just asking, "How can we sell more yogurt?" but rather, "What jobs could a morning snack do that yogurt isn’t handling yet?"

Benefits of using JTBD in food innovation and consumer insights

Applied correctly, JTBD benefits food brands in several ways:

• Clarifies unmet needs – Helps you spot gaps in the market that aren’t visible through basic demographic or category data.
• Informs meaningful innovation – New ideas are rooted in real-life situations and pain points, increasing their relevance.
• Aligns teams with consumer reality – JTBD findings are often shared in human language that internal teams can rally around.

The framework is especially powerful when layered with qualitative and quantitative consumer insights, allowing teams to move from high-level understanding to detailed product concepts. At SIVO Insights, we often use JTBD within larger custom research projects to help brands identify clear, actionable paths forward. It’s one of many tools available – but when it comes to entering new meal occasions, it’s among the most effective for keeping innovation grounded in real human needs.

Dayparts – the distinct parts of a consumer’s day when specific food and beverage choices are made – represent powerful pockets of growth when understood correctly. These include obvious moments like breakfast, lunch, and dinner, but also more nuanced ones like pre-workout, mid-morning, afternoon pick-me-up, or late-night cravings. Key to tapping into these moments is uncovering the 'jobs' consumers are trying to get done during each occasion. That’s where JTBD comes in.

From time of day to intent: mapping meal occasions

While dayparts are often defined by the clock, JTBD shifts the focus to motivation. For example:

• Breakfast isn’t just about fueling up – it might be about maximizing time, avoiding hunger before a commute, or staying healthy without cooking.
• Snacking isn’t random – it’s often about staying alert, relieving stress, or curbing cravings without overdoing calories.
• Late-night eating can be driven by comfort, reward, or unwinding after a long day.

By understanding the underlying job, brands can tailor products that match the consumer’s desired outcome – not just their schedule.

How to expand food products into new dayparts with JTBD

If your brand wants to move into a new meal occasion, JTBD can guide the process. Here’s how it works:

1. Start with consumer research

Begin by observing and speaking with consumers across different contexts. What are they eating during “off hours”? What’s working – and what’s not? These insights help uncover jobs that current products aren’t fulfilling. For example, a fictional snack brand might discover that while people want a healthy option at 10 PM, most better-for-you snacks feel too 'daytime.' That’s a clue there’s unmet potential.

2. Identify job clusters by daypart

Group similar “jobs” to form zones of opportunity. In SIVO’s work, we look at patterns across demographics, behavior, and emotion to identify where change is most impactful. For example:

• Mid-morning: Fast, no-mess, light fuel options (e.g., one-handed bites for parents or commuters)
• Afternoon: Mood-boosting or focus-enhancing snacking needs
• Night: Comfort food that still meets health goals

3. Translate insights into product strategy

Once gaps are identified, brands can build product ideas that solve a specific job. This could show up as:

• Breakfast bars optimized for mental clarity, not just energy
• Protein-rich puddings designed for guilt-free late-night indulgence
• Smart packaging and formats tailored to daypart-specific needs

Targeting specific dayparts through JTBD thinking allows brands to move beyond generic benefit claims and toward truly job-specific solutions. Instead of being “just another snack,” you become the right snack for the job – whether that’s tackling mid-morning sluggishness or helping someone wind down at the end of their day.

Ultimately, JTBD helps food brands approach daypart expansion not as a marketing exercise, but as a mission to serve consumers where their needs are currently unmet. It’s not just about creating more products – it’s about creating products that matter at the right moment.

Success in expanding into new eating occasions often starts with understanding the "job" the consumer is trying to get done – whether it's grabbing something convenient in the morning, curbing mid-afternoon hunger, or satisfying a late-night craving. Several food and beverage brands have leveraged the Jobs To Be Done (JTBD) framework to launch offerings tailored to new dayparts. Here’s how that looks in real life.

Expanding into Breakfast with Functional Benefits

Consider a fictional yogurt brand traditionally known for lunchtime snacking. Using JTBD research, the brand discovered that younger professionals were skipping breakfast due to time constraints but still wanted something quick, energizing, and satisfying. The unmet job wasn’t just “eating breakfast” – it was “starting the day on a productive note without cooking.” As a result, the brand developed a high-protein, portable yogurt with added caffeine and fiber to meet this morning-specific job.

Meeting Midday Hunger with Protein-Focused Options

Another hypothetical example involves a snack bar company expanding into the afternoon snacking daypart. By mapping consumer motivations, they realized busy parents often faced hunger between lunch and dinner but wanted to avoid sugar crashes or junk food. The 'job to be done' here was “getting through the afternoon with sustained energy.” This led to a new line of low-sugar, protein-rich bars designed for steady energy without the crash – and messaging that clearly tied the product to that afternoon need state.

Late-Night Comfort Foods with a Modern Spin

Late-night eating is often tied to indulgence or relaxation. One fictional frozen food brand saw an opportunity to meet a consumer job of “winding down with something warm and comforting – without feeling guilty.” By combining familiar comfort-food flavors with better-for-you ingredients, the brand reframed the late-night snack as part of a self-care ritual, rather than an unhealthy habit.

These types of wins all stem from a keen understanding of the consumer’s unmet needs, not just product gaps. JTBD helps uncover the real-life moments where people struggle – and gives food brands a clearer path to develop solutions that fit seamlessly into these eating occasions.

To successfully enter new dayparts, food brands must first identify where unmet needs exist. This requires more than trend-spotting – it’s about deeply understanding the context of how and why people eat throughout the day. That’s where consumer insights and the JTBD framework come together in powerful ways.

Start with Actual Daily Routines

People’s food choices are tightly connected to their schedules, moods, and even social environments. Instead of assuming what counts as a “snack” or a “meal,” it's helpful to observe the entire day in terms of natural need states. For example:

• Is there a common energy dip at 3 p.m. where consumers want to avoid caffeine but still need a pick-me-up?
• Are parents looking for an easy breakfast that works for both them and their kids?
• Do late-night shift workers need convenient, filling options after hours?

These moments represent more than times of day – they’re jobs waiting to be fulfilled through innovative food offerings.

Use Qualitative Research for Depth

Methods like in-home ethnographies, digital diaries, and shop-alongs can reveal not just what people eat, but why. For instance, a qualitative study may uncover that someone grabs chips late at night not due to hunger, but to decompress with comfort food. That emotional component becomes a key job to address – one that traditional category analytics could miss entirely.

Quantitative Validation for Opportunity Sizing

Once core consumer jobs are identified through qualitative work, surveys and behavioral data can help validate how widespread these jobs are. This combination of methods allows brands to prioritize dayparts that are not only underserved but offer meaningful volume potential.

Mapping eating occasions using consumer jobs rather than product categories opens the door to more targeted innovation. Instead of chasing “snack trends,” brands can focus on solving problems like “something satisfying and sugar-free after kids go to bed” – paving the way for smarter meal occasion insights and focused food brand strategy.

Integrating Jobs To Be Done into your food innovation workflow doesn’t require a complete overhaul – it simply adds structure and purpose to how you identify unmet needs and design products. Here are simple, beginner-friendly steps to embed JTBD into your team’s approach.

1. Reframe Your Research Goals

Instead of asking, “What snacks do people want?”, shift to, “What situations drive people to reach for food during the day – and what do they really need in those moments?” This change in mindset helps uncover deeper motivations behind consumer behavior.

2. Layer JTBD into Existing Research

If you already conduct qualitative or quantitative research, consider adding JTBD-related questions. For example, during interviews, ask participants: “Tell me about a time when you couldn’t find the right food for a specific moment. What were you looking for emotionally or functionally?”

3. Don’t Skip the ‘Why’ Behind Choices

Gathering actual product likes/dislikes is helpful, but JTBD pushes you to understand why a consumer made that choice. Look beyond demographics or consumption frequency – focus on the emotional and functional jobs being fulfilled.

4. Align Internal Teams Around Jobs, Not Just Categories

By organizing brainstorming and innovation pipelines around core consumer jobs (e.g., “fuel between meetings” or “decompress at night”), teams stay closer to real-world needs. This leads to more relevant concepts and positioning strategies.

5. Pair JTBD Mapping with Volume Potential

While JTBD uncovers unmet needs, not every need will be worth pursuing. Use demand sizing and occasion frequency data to prioritize which jobs have enough scale to support market expansion.

6. Leverage Cross-Functional Input

Bringing in perspectives from marketing, insights, R&D, and packaging can help identify how a product can fully solve a consumer job – not just in composition, but in communication and delivery format.

In the end, JTBD isn’t a buzzword – it’s a practical tool to bring consumer insights to life in ways that spark smarter food innovation. When used thoughtfully, it gives brand teams a clearer way to design offerings that solve real problems – across new dayparts or beyond.