The Rise of Wellness Dining in Hospitality

The future of hospitality is being shaped around the dining table.

Food and beverage has long been a cornerstone of the guest experience; today, it is being redefined by shifting attitudes as health and wellness become fundamental expectations. For hotel groups, the opportunity is clear: move beyond menu upgrades to strategically integrate wellness across F&B, spanning guest well-being, operational resilience, and talent development.

Wellness has moved into the mainstream – nowhere more visibly than at the dining table. Healthiness has overtaken affordability as the top eating-related value across generations; globally, “health and wellness foods” – already a near trillion-dollar category – is projected to grow strongly through 2030.

As what was once a specialized offering becomes a baseline expectation, hospitality’s opportunity is to shift “the healthy choice” from side plate to main course, replacing the old sense of sacrifice and restraint with one of taste, discovery, and pleasure. For innovative players, the table is laid for a full transformation: making healthy eating a widespread option, leveraging sustainable sourcing to build business resilience, and building a talent platform on the creative wellness kitchen.

Especially for Millennials and Gen Z, wellness is a personalized daily practice strongly tied to nutrition, and one they expect to maintain when away from home. As once-niche dietary requirements – flexitarian, plant-based, gluten-free, gut-friendly, low- and no-alcohol – enter the mainstream, the emphasis has shifted away from restriction and sacrifice towards pleasure and positivity.

Wellness Dining at Novotel

At Novotel, the revolution is underway as the Longevity Everyday strategy transforms the brand’s culinary approach with a focus on flavor and sustainability. By the end of 2026, guests will see at least 25% plant-forward options across all hotels - 50% of hotels have already achieved this target.

Kitchen teams are receiving world-class training from the Culinary Institute of America to create delicious, healthier, sustainable choices and a multi-year collaboration with plant-forward cook and food influencer Alfie Steiner is bringing new recipes to Novotel menus and inspiring guests with plant-forward dishes they can recreate at home. Along with its pioneering ocean commitment with WWF to strengthen seafood sustainability, Novotel is at the forefront of the wellness dining trend.

While responsible sourcing meets rising guest expectations for transparency, it also builds a more resilient supply chain. Commodity volatility and ecosystem degradation are driving availability constraints, quality swings and price shocks – see for example the doubling of cocoa and coffee prices in 2024 alone (up 163% and 103% respectively) due to extreme weather.

In this context, hotels that redesign menus around a plant-forward balance, combined with more resilient sourcing choices, are better positioned to secure supply, stabilize costs, and protect brand trust.

Building a Resilient Supply Chain for Accor

Accor’s Good Food Policy is a bold, holistic vision designed to reduce operational cost, support local economies, and promote guest well-being.  

This vision is translated into strong, time‑bound commitments by 2030, such as increasing the share of plant‑forward dishes on menus, serving only responsibly sourced coffee, and banning endangered seafood species. These commitments exemplify the operational translation of wellness‑focused F&B at scale.

This shift is not a simple menu tweak, but a capability shift – and capability is owned by people. Forward-thinking hospitality players that anchor F&B in clear values (healthier living, responsible sourcing, lower impact) and give teams a creative playground for menu innovation will be better positioned to attract, secure, and develop culinary talent.

Wellness-centered F&B is a talent strategy as much as a guest strategy: a mission-led craft platform that builds belonging, pride, progression, and performance.

For chefs on the ground, this shift is also deeply human. Beyond sourcing and menus, it is about transmission, inclusion, and growth. As Habib Benkhelifat, Chef at Novotel Nice Arenas, explains: “Sustainability is not only about products, but also about people — training, supporting and helping teams grow, and passing on responsible know-how.” In that sense, kitchens become not just places of execution, but places of progression.

Brands have the opportunity to scale plant-forward dining as a lifestyle with taste and creativity at its heart. As a visible mission with a skills development path, it can act as a lever for talent attraction and retention, enhancing attractiveness for chefs, F&B leaders, and younger talents seeking purpose and growth.

More broadly, Fairmont hotels are investing in structured mentoring and development programs to help chefs grow beyond technical expertise, building leadership skills and a deeper understanding of sustainability and sourcing.

Meanwhile, on the Chinese island of Hainan, chefs from four Sofitel hotels joined creative forces in 2025 to launch 88 Bites, a year-long celebration of sustainable local cuisine. It’s a compelling demonstration of how wellness “constraints” can unleash creativity to create authentic, inspiring guest experiences while mobilizing cross-hotel teams around a common purpose.

The table has been reset. Wellness is now fundamental to hospitality. Hotel groups that build it into their operations – from menu design to sourcing models to culinary culture – will define the next era of hospitality.