Editor’s Note

In this ongoing winter of economic discontent, a ray of spring sunshine comes to food retailers in a missive we recently received from Technomic, which says that consumers are sourcing prepared meals from a wider range of retail foodservice operations than they were two years ago, many times at the expense of restaurants.

Traditional supermarkets, c-stores, and mass merchandisers have been able to grow their share of the food-away-from-home market as they expand their foodservice platforms and build on consumer desire for convenience, quality, and variety of offerings in retail locations.

“Retailers benefit from the fact that the consumers are already visiting them for other purchases,” says Darren Tristano, EVP of Technomic. “If retailers can offer a foodservice option that rivals that of restaurants in terms of quality, freshness, and variety, they can build on the advantage they inherently enjoy when it comes to convenience.”

Technomic’s new “Retailer Meal Solutions Consumer Trend Report” has some other interesting facts, like:

• Health is an important factor in the Retail Meals Solutions (RMS) purchasing decision, and seems to be of greater importance for RMS occasions than for restaurant meals. About two in five consumers say that they usually consider nutrition when purchasing prepared foods, compared to only about a quarter who say they consider nutrition when ordering food at restaurants.

• Kid appeal stands out as the primary concept attribute that consumers think RMS programs are lacking. The attribute related to RMS’ appeal to children ranked among the bottom three for each type of retailer as applied to both limited and full-service restaurants.

• Forty percent of consumers who visit mass merchandisers and convenience stores for RMS purchases, do so at least once a week at those locations.

As your teachers or parents would say: keep up the good work!