At least for now, the number of meals prepared at home is falling.
That means have retailers have an escalating fight on their hands for consumers’ food dollars, said Jonna Parker, team lead for fresh with IRI, in analyzing July consumer behavior during July.
“Whereas in May, the IRI survey of primary shoppers found that 40% had dined inside at a restaurant, come July this share has risen to 50%,” Parker said in a report compiled by 210 Analytics, IRI and the Produce Marketing Association.
“At the same time, restaurant takeout (53% of shoppers) and home delivery (21%) are unchanged from their May levels. The share of meals prepared at home is estimated at 76.6% across meal occasions in July 2021, down more than 5% from 82% in July 2020, Parker said.
Some workers in July were returning to the office, the report said. In January this year, 45% of shoppers indicated they would not or rarely work from home, but that percentage had risen to 55% by July, according to the report.
Consumers also said they are increasing trips to the grocery store. In November 2020, 62% of consumers indicated they would do all their shopping in store in the coming four weeks. That share rose to 71% who planned to exclusively shop in-store in July.
In addition to more in-store trips, the average time spent in the store rose to a 12-month high at an average of 32.3 minutes, according to the release.
Fruit bump
Fresh produce generated $5.9 billion in sales during the four July 2021 weeks, according to the release. That is up $97 million from the four June 2021 weeks. Fresh fruit drove all of the gains, with year-over-year growth of 1.2% versus compared with a 5.4% sales decline for vegetables.
“While both fruit and vegetables were up about 11% versus July 2019, fruit is having the better year-over-year performance,” Joe Watson, vice president of membership and engagement for the Produce Marketing Association, said in the report. “The difference is the outstanding performance of vegetables in 2020, which means a tougher road for growth this year. Additionally, fruit has experienced slightly higher inflation thus far in 2021 than vegetables, which boosts dollar sales gains.”
The report said the fresh share of total fruit and vegetable dollars across the store remained unchanged at 83.9% in July 2021.
August will be an “interesting” test case relative to the normalization of the marketplace thus far in 2021 as the Delta variant of the COVID-19 virus is prompting an increase of new COVID cases across the country, the report said. Over the past few months, the normalization of shopping patterns including a return to in-store shopping, spending more time as well as on-premises restaurant dining, has been largely driven by vaccinated Americans, according to the report.
Anne-Marie Roerink, president, 210 Analytics, said in the report that the July numbers don’t reflect the impact in the rising number of COVID-19 infections in recent weeks.
“Personally, I do not believe we will see similar big stock-up upswings as we saw last year,” Roerink said. Instead, she said the upswing in cases could lead to a bit of a return to online orders and some spending shifting back to retail as well as restaurant takeout/delivery. “We will have to see what the next few weeks hold,” she said.