Jack Li, founder of the market analytics firm Datassential, said consumer surveys on June 1 found 49% of consumers “definitely avoid” eating out, but it was the first time that number had dropped below 50% since mid-March.

“So we have far fewer people saying I'm just not even considering getting food away from home,” Li said.

 “Comfort foods perform particularly well during recession,” said Talita Ramos Erickson, general counsel and CEO of Barilla, explaining that lasagna, pizza sauce and mac and cheese are the fastest growing items for Barilla in retail channels.

“There’s no reason to think that this is a quick fad,” Ramos Erickson told the “Comfort Foods to Go: Best-in-Class Marketing and Execution” panel.

Of consumers surveyed in May, dining in restaurants was considered truly safe by 42% of respondents, while 80% said drive-thru and curbside pickup were safe, Erin Murray, Datassential’s director of consumer solutions, told the “With Caution and Care: Meeting Consumers’ New Needs.”

Brian Whitney, vice president of sales for the cloud point-of-sale and analytics platform Appetize, in the “How to Enable Touch-Free Guest Experiences in Restaurants” session said the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated technological changes already underway.

“COVID-19 hasn’t exposed new technologies,” Whitney said, “But it has accelerated new technologies.” He estimated three to four years of mobile technology adoption growth has been compressed into the first several months of the coronavirus pandemic.

Consumer behavior has change markedly, for example, with contactless payments up 40% since the pandemic was declared, Whitney said in citing a MasterCard survey.

Morning Consult polled consumers, and 48% don’t want to use cash and 69% want contactless payments, he said.

 “Customers are really looking for a touch-free ordering experience,” said.

Breakfast is the daypart that probably saw more impact from coronavirus and its stay-at-home orders than other segments, panelists said on the “Back to Normal: Using Coffee to get Back in the Black” session sponsored by Segafredo Zanetti.

Maeve Webster, president of the Menu Matters consultancy to food manufacturers and operators, cited NPD/CREST and Datassential research that indicated the breakfast daypart as a share of away-from-home traffic, essentially went from 20% of all such traffic before the pandemic, down to less than 10%, or 8%.

“So breakfast has some ground to cover in order to come back from what happened to it over the last three months,” Webster said.

Denyelle Bruno, CEO of Tender Greens, said on the “Power & Purpose” leadership panel that the current civil rights protests can exhibit a positive impact.

“There’s a national movement that’s happening with millions of people,” Bruno said. “And we look around at those crowds, they’re very diverse. There are a lot of people in this country who are supportive of the Black Lives Matter movement. It’s not a small faction of society, which is the amazing result of this.

“I think people are able to connect,” she said. “We, as a company, we’ve always been on the side of social justice, so despite the fact that these protests are happening as a result of some very sad events, the good news is they are energizing and they are uniting people in a way that hasn’t happened before."

Catherine Golding, manager for Meat & Livestock Australia, told “The Meat of the Matter” panel that surveys are finding consumers put a premium on value that goes beyond price.

“We’re quite surprised to see, in not just one survey but quite a few surveys, that consumers care, and care even more, about the environment during this pandemic, and the expectation is that they will continue to do so after we get through this hurdle and drama that has been unfolding before us,” Golding said.

"Trust, transparency and technology will be what's needed to get customers back,” said C.J. Lewis co-founder and chief operating officer of Jolt, a food-safety automation platform.

Lewis said restaurants should be as transparent as possible with customers to create consumer confidence.

He suggested using digital dashboards to display in real time such information as employee temperature checks or when rooms were last sanitized.