Oser Communications Group

GOURMET NEWS JULY 2014 www.gourmetnews.com GENERAL NEWS 4 Eating Better Continued from PAGE 1 stores. Not all of them—some of them struggled," said Cross. "Walmart made so much money from its groceries that Target noticed and started expanding its grocery operations. IKEA—who would have thought that?—IKEA sells food now." Time-stressed Americans are increasingly turning to grab-and-go options, either stop- ping at the grocery store or picking up takeout. Increasingly, consumers are able to go either to the frozen or fresh section of their grocery store and pick up an item that they can take back to their office for lunch or home for dinner. Contemporary American women in par- ticular are time-stressed and concerned about their health, and both of those fac- tors are influencing this trend. This is ac- cording to Jimmy Matorin, Business Catalyst for SMARTKETING. Matorin pointed to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics figures that show that Americans are now spending an average of 8.8 hours per day working and just 1.1 hours per day eating. The same survey shows that time in front of the stove has decreased slightly over the past few years. The Bureau of Labor Statis- tics' 2012 American Time Use Study (the most recent data available) shows that Americans now spend only an average of just over half an hour a day on food prepa- ration and cleanup. Two major subdemographic groups are making the food choices that are changing the market for the American food industry, Matorin said: the 31 million independent women who are 27 and older and who con- trol about $50 billion in terms of food and beverage sales and the millennial-genera- tion mothers who make up about 22 per- cent of all millennials. "They're working and want to stay healthy, but they're suffer- ing from time deprivation," Matorin said. Stephanie Robbins, Director of Brand De- velopment for La Terra Fina, is one of those seeing these trends firsthand. La Terra Fina makes a line of ready-made quiches and dips whose sales have been growing over the past few years. Robbins says that consumers seem to be especially interested in products they can use in multiple ways. "Time crunch is a big factor, but there's a real strong move- ment where people are really looking at the quality of their food and that they're made from the same ingredients they would use," she said. "That's really where we're seeing the largest growth happening in food, being able to help with that." La Terra Fina's target market is a mix of people looking for something fresh and homemade, with quality ingredients that they can prepare very quickly. The com- pany's customers are people who want to do a little bit of cooking but need some help in sourcing ingredients that might not be on their home pantry shelves or are somehow messy or difficult to prepare. "In either case, they're looking for quality in- gredients, fresh taste, something that's as good as they would make themselves but without the mess and inconvenience of having to do it," said Robbins. While the La Terra Fina's quiche line an- swers the call for quick and effortless preparation, the company's dips are appeal- ing to customers who are shopping for products they can use in multiple ways, for example as ingredients in dishes that are not exactly made from scratch but that feel like that to the cook. "People are wanting to cook. The Food Network has been ex- tremely influential in people wanting to cook, but families are so busy that the time to cook is shortened … People are looking for items that can reduce cooking time, so that they can cook the dinner in under 30 minutes," Robbins said. "We have a recipe on our website where you simply take a filet of salmon, and you put our dip on top and add a crunchy topping, and you bake it … Now you've got something that you constructed—a main course for your meal—and you made it in just a few min- utes, and it's healthful, and it's flavorful." According to U.S. government statistics, as more Americans began to stop by their grocery stores in recent years to pick up their meals and snacks instead of just run- ning through the drive-through lane of a fast-food restaurant on their way home from work, public nutrition has experienced a slight improvement. A report issued by the U.S. Department of Agriculture in January of 2014 documents that consumption of food away from home instead of food pur- chased at a grocery store and eaten at home increases total caloric intake and reduces diet quality among both adults and children. The study found that adults were more mindful of their nutrition and used nutrition information more when they shopped for food in grocery stores than when choosing foods at a restaurant. This reinforces the idea that the improvements in diet quality that occurred during the Great Recession were not solely due to decreases in the amount of restaurant meals consumed by Americans but were also due to additional changes in consumer food choices. The USDA study report said that from 2007-2008 and from 2009-2010, the share of study participants that reported using the Nutrition Facts Panel when deciding whether to buy a food product "always or most of the time" rose from 34 to 42 per- cent. In addition, the share that reported using package health claims in their food purchasing decisions increased from 18 to 31 percent. Working-age Americans who participated in the study have become more likely to report that nutrition is important to them when they shop for food. The above phenomenon, along with widespread suspicion about the role of added sugar (especially in sweetened soft drinks) in causing childhood obesity, helps explain the success of stevia products of- fered by Wisdom Natural Brands under the SweetLeaf brand. According to James May, the company's founder and CEO, "Stevia is the only sweetener on the face of the Earth that actually generates better health and well-being in the human body." May points to more than 1,500 published scientific studies that he says illustrate the positive health aspects of stevia. "Sweet Leaf stevia has zero calories, zero carbs and a glycemic index of zero," he said. "And of course, it's gluten-free." Around the world, about 165 million people ingest stevia every day, and it has been widely used in Japan as a commercial sweetener ever since it was approved for that use by the Japanese government in 1975, May said. "Stevia's not new. It's only new in this country and in Europe." According to May, consumers have adopted SweetLeaf's Sweet Drops liquids as a convenience for making home-made sugar-free sodas and in flavoring nonfat milk and coffee. He added that consumers invented another use for the flavored drops that has him especially excited. Some of them discovered that they could mix the chocolate- and peppermint-flavored Sweet Drops with plain yogurt and "freeze it in dollops for a product that tastes exactly like peppermint patty candy," he said. GN PLMA Study Finds Value Tops Millenials' Shopping Priorities; Loyalty to National Brands Less of a Factor A new nationwide study from the Private Label Manufacturers Association casts sig- nificant light on the grocery-shopping pat- terns of millennials, the 100 million Americans born between 1980 and 2000. Millennials represent a multi-trillion dol- lar marketing opportunity. By 2016, experts predict they will become the country's most powerful consumer bloc. Over time, mil- lenials are expected to become the most economically impactful generation in U.S. history, outspending even the baby boomer generation. The group already accounts for $1.3 trillion in overall direct annual spend- ing, and it is predicted they will buy $60 billion in consumer packaged goods over the next decade. Still, little is known of the millennial shopping mindset, and grocery retailers have largely ignored this consumer segment. For a generation known for spending large sums of money on smartphones, tablets and computers, research shows that among millennials who identify themselves as primary grocery shoppers for their households, value is the key to their gro- cery-purchasing behavior. According to the PLMA study, millenni- als shop for groceries often and widely, and supermarkets are their most popular choice. Lead factors in what they choose to buy include previous experience with a product, their shopping list and coupons. Seven in 10 millennials belong to at least one loyalty program. In choosing a store or product, millenials seek out affordability, value and lowest price. They are also regu- lar purchasers of store brands, think highly of such products and give them high marks versus national brands. The PLMA study also revealed that mil- lennials overwhelmingly see their genera- tion as different from previous ones and are optimistic about their future. However, many express resignation about their sta- tus. Half say their generation is financially less well off than previous ones, and one in five say their life is worse than that of their parents. Still, millennials expect big changes in the future. Half of those sur- veyed said that they expect stores in the fu- ture will look nothing like they do now, and a third believe many of today's national brands will eventually cease to exist. Another interesting find made in the PLMA survey is that brand loyalty is not a major pull for millennials. When a national brand individuals wish to buy is not avail- able on the shelf, four in 10 millennials said that they choose the store brand, while one-third pick a differ- ent national brand. Just one in eight look else- where for the national brand they initially wanted. Still, the survey showed that millennials are universally familiar with store brands and buy them regularly. Sev- enty-one percent said value is the main reason they purchase a store brand product as op- posed to a national brand. Product quality improvements and a good prior experience will drive their future store brand purchase. "Millennials have rev- olutionized the way we communicate," said Brian Sharoff, PLMA President. "They have created a world of 'likes' and 'friends' larger than all television audiences combined. But who are they? For those who run supermarkets, drug chains and mass merchandisers, they are still enigmatic. Hopefully, this study will help clar- ify how they shop and what they want." The PLMA study was conducted by Surveylab, a lead- ing online opinion consultant. It con- sisted of more than sixty questions aimed at determin- ing what moves the millennial genera- tion. Nearly 1,600 men and women ages 18-33 who identified them- selves as the pri- mary grocery shopper for their household completed the survey. To re- quest a free copy of PLMA's new consumer research study, "The Millennials Are Com- ing," email research@plma.com. GN

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