Allow delaying the initial message consumption

[bruno-baehr]

Expected Behavior
Allow configuring an initial delay before the first message processing when using @RetryableTopic.
This would make it possible to postpone the first consumption attempt for a configurable amount of time, instead of processing the message immediately after it is received.

Current Behavior
Currently, messages are processed immediately after being consumed, and delays only apply to retry attempts after a failure.
There is no way to delay the first processing attempt when the message is initially received.

Context
In my use case, I call a third-party API that starts an asynchronous process. Right after that, I publish a Kafka message to call another endpoint from the same API and retrieve the final result.
The issue is that this second endpoint is only ready about 1 minute later. Since the message is consumed immediately, the first processing attempt happens too early.
A configuration to delay the first message processing would help in scenarios where external systems need some time before the data becomes available.

[GollapudiSrikanth]

Hi Team,
I’d be happy to take a look at this if it’s still available.

My understanding is that the request is to support an optional delay before the initial processing attempt when using @RetryableTopic, while preserving existing retry-delay behavior and backward compatibility.

Please feel free to assign it to me if that aligns with the intended direction. I’d be happy to first explore possible configuration approaches and share a proposal.