Meal Kits: Changing The Way Consumers Think About Food at Home
As consumer interest in pre-packaged meal kits and online meal kit subscription services grows, the format provides new opportunities for meat manufacturers.
Pressed for time and looking for convenient and nutritious meal options, U.S. consumers are turning to meal kits and meal kit delivery services, which can help make serving up dinner a breeze. Meal kits provide pre-packaged ingredients along with simple-to-follow recipes that appeal to everyone from urban millennials to families with limited time to prepare a home-cooked meal. ,
Some consumers prefer not to search for recipes, shop at the grocery store for individual ingredients or prepare all the ingredients for a complex recipe. That’s where meal kits come in—one package or box that includes fresh ingredients, recipes with step-by-step directions and exciting flavors for consumers to try.
Worldwide, the meal kit market has risen to over $1 billion in recent years, and Technomic Inc., a food industry consulting firm, predicts it will transform the way consumers prepare meals at home.
“We project the fresh food subscription market in the U.S. alone will grow to a multi-billion dollar market over the next five years,” says Erik Thoresen, principal at Technomic. “This growth is fueled by growing consumer acceptance of the subscription service model, as well as a strengthening food culture within the mainstream market.”
Plated, Blue Apron, PeachDish, Chef’D, HelloFresh, Terra’s Kitchen, and Home Chef are just a few examples of online subscription meal kit delivery services available in the U.S., with other local services sprouting up, especially in urban areas. , Often, each online subscription service has its own spin on ingredients and recipes that range in complexity, depending on the consumer’s desired level of food preparation and cooking time.
The kits may include various meats or seafood, starches, vegetables, spices, and other ingredients already pre-measured, sometimes even pre-chopped, and ready to cook. Consumers may only need cooking oil, salt and pepper on hand at home to complete the recipe. The kits appeal to consumers looking to simplify meal preparation, and some services even cater to consumers with special dietary preferences, such as vegan, Paleo, gluten-free, dairy-free and others.
As non-traditional retail channels’, such as e-retail’s, growth booms, meat manufacturers, along with other food manufacturers, have an opportunity to partner with these innovative food delivery methods to meet consumers’ rising demand for easy-to-prepare meals at home. , While meal kits still represent only a small portion of the overall food market, food manufacturers have an opportunity to develop creative and convenient meal kit options, especially for consumers with fast-paced lifestyles.
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