Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Retail foodservice paradigm shift underway, the beneficiary is the fresh prepared Ready-2-Eat niche!


While spending patterns on retail food away from home began to turn in 2005 as we documented in our white paper: Restaurant Consumer Discontinuity the consumer moved first (see link below).

The one bright sector within foodservice is the grocerant niche of fresh prepared better for you foods that are found in Convenience stores, Supermarkets, Grocery stores and many Restaurants.

Not only is this sector growing the opportunity for other additional avenues of distribution are opening continually. Recently Walgreen’s announced that they are entering the fresh prepared food niche. That over time can provide an additional 15,000+ outlets to the mix!

Foodservice industry research leader Technomic’s Bob Goldin when speaking about the restaurant sector recently stated “Over the next five years, we anticipate the industry will face major macro-economic headwinds including a high level of un-and under-employment, a sharp increase in lower-income households, weakness in the housing market, increased borrowing costs, and flat wages."...

"From a demographic perspective, the rapidly aging population cannot be considered anything but a negative for the industry since older consumers use foodservice less often than younger groups. Further, the boost the industry received in the 1980s and 90s from the large increase in working women will not repeat. Structurally, unit expansion will no longer be a growth catalyst. We are likely to see a net reduction in the number of restaurant units over the next five years, a definite paradigm shift.”

Mix and Match fresh meal components are driving the grocerant sector to the forefront of the food retailing. Manufactures, retailers and consumer are all experimenting with this niche. The one thing we understand is that momentum for this niche will continue to build.

www.FoodserviceSolutions.us  of Tacoma, WA is the global leader in the Grocerant niche providing Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat insights, opportunity and information. For more read this article: http://www.anything4restaurants.com/blog/index.php/2009/07/restaurant-consumer-discontinuity-the-consumer-moved-first/ Contact: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us 

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