Fresh categories are driving nearly 49 percent of all dollar growth across fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG), according to Nielsen’s latest Total Consumer Report, with fresh and perishable foods accounting more than $177 billion in sales.
Although fresh categories are performing well in Retail stores, the sector still has some room for improvement, according to the June 2018 report.
Some findings include:
- Ecommerce is still maturing within food and beverage, but fresh perishables are an opportunity in stores today. Amazon and Whole Foods merged a year ago, and ecommerce within grocery continues to grow, but is still maturing. During the past year, online food and beverage sales represented 13 percent of the overall dollar volume seen online. Fresh and perishable foods generated sales nearly 14 times as high as all online food and beverage sales this year.
- On-the-go fresh produce fails to keep pace with clean snacking. Americans are not rushing to on-the-go fresh produce opportunities although they rank eating more fruits and vegetables as the top factor for healthy eating. They often prefer other snack options. On-the-go fresh produce — pre-cut produce that has been portioned intentionally for snacking purposes — declined by nearly 2 percent in dollars and 6 percent in unit volume over the past year. On the flip side, salty snacks are proof that consumers are seeking indulgence in their snacking purchases, too, as sales grew nearly $1 billion year over year. Still, clean-label products represented more than 35 percent of salty snack dollars in the past year.
In the battle of the burgers, frozen is still winning, but fresh is catching up; meanwhile, alternative protein growth remains strong. Frozen patties are still the staple in the burger category, as frozen meat-based burgers have seen 2 percent dollar growth from last year. However, fresh meat burger patties (up 8 percent) and prepared burgers from the deli section (up 15 percent) are both growing and asserting their importance to the future of the category. Within the past year, sales of alternative-protein burgers have experienced dollar sales growth of nearly 21 percent. However, alternative-protein burgers represent just 6 percent of the overall burger category. Despite this, frozen alternative-protein burgers grew 17 percent year over year, which highlights an area for potential expansion.