Consumers Bond Over Meal Kits

Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru®, Steven Johnson based in Tacoma, WA stated “Meal Kits are training wheels for Millennials”.  However, meal kits are much more than that they have become a platform for couples to bond with each other and while discovering new flavors and the joy of cooking.

In new research we have learned that Meal kit sales continued to show strength in 2018, according Nielsen. “There has been a massive shift to the in-store space in the last year,” said Meagan Nelson, Nielsen’s associate director for fresh growth and strategy, at the Annual Meat Conference recently

Nelson said “growth in meal kits has been fueled in part by online subscription companies partnering with brick-and-mortar groceries, supermarkets offering their own packaged options and even restaurant brands dipping their toes into the market. Retail food partnerships can drive new electricity in a category or for a banner.

The Neilsen data indicated meal kits had seen a 36% growth in just under a year. A survey of 43,000 consumers in late 2018 found 12% of consumers had purchased meal kits in the past six months and 23% of shoppers would consider trying a kit in the next six months, Nelson said.

A number of customers buy in both the online and in-store channels, Nelson noted, but in-store purchases accounted for 60% of the growth in meal kit sales.

Why food retailers should care; meal kit customers tended to be higher income and younger than typical shoppers, she said. Demographics indicate meal kit purchase growing among those in households with incomes of $100,000 or more. They also saw appeal, both online and in-store, among those aged 35 to 44, Nelson said.

In-store growth rate for meal kits was $93 million in 2018, up 51% from 2017, and 7.3 million units were sold, an increase of 42%.  About 87% of in-store meal kits included meat in 2018, with beef leading the way among animal proteins at 52%, followed by pork at 17% and chicken at 16%.

Foodservice Solutions® specializes in outsourced business development. We can help you identify, quantify and qualify additional food retail segment opportunities or a new menu product segment and brand and menu integration strategy.  Foodservice Solutions® of Tacoma WA is the global leader in the Grocerant niche visit Facebook.com/Steven Johnson, Linkedin.com/in/grocerant/ or twitter.com/grocerant