FMI Highlights Key Trends Influencing Future of Food Shopping
Despite an unsettled economy, U.S. consumers still enjoy grocery shopping and have maintained notably consistent shopping habits, according to the latest annual survey from FMI – The Food Industry Association, conducted by The Hartman Group. The report, which starts off FMI’s “2025 U.S. Grocery Shopper Trends: The Logic of Food Shopping” series, provides timely insights into consumer grocery shopping behaviors.
FMI probed shopper goals to “eat well,” an outlook that forms the basis of how they think about value and shapes their choices about what food to buy, how to cook and where to shop.
“While it’s important to remember that ‘eating well’ can vary from person to person, regardless of their definition, shoppers do share common themes, needs, priorities and values, including things like health and nutrition; interest in cooking; fresh, healthful food; sharing meals with friends and family; and eating ethically,” noted Leslie G. Sarasin, president and CEO of Arlington, Va.-based FMI, at the start of a media briefing during which some of the trade organization’s executives discussed the research in depth.
Still, 70% of Americans admitted to being extremely or very worried about higher grocery prices, and 78% said that they’re at least somewhat concerned about the effect of tariffs on the cost of imported food and ingredients.
While 75% of consumers said that they currently feel in control of their grocery spending, that confidence has declined since last September, when 85% felt that way. As a response, shoppers are employing various strategies to economize on groceries, among them list-making (83%), taking household inventory (79%), meal planning (69%), and seeking out coupons or discounts (60%).
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“This latest research demonstrates our opportunity to reach shoppers where they are in this economic environment,” added Sarasin. “Notably, there are 42 million Americans who rely on a program called SNAP ... that helps seniors, kids and people with disabilities buy groceries, which is facing some potentially significant proposed changes at both the state and federal levels that could impact a lot of lives.”
On the subject of SNAP, according to an FMI-commissioned survey of 1,000 registered voters, 64% have a favorable view of the program, with strong support across all partisan groups, FMI Chief Public Policy Officer Jennifer Hatcher pointed out during the briefing.
“Voters understand that SNAP is a hunger program, but there are a lot of details and facts about SNAP that voters do not understand or know about, and that’s where we come in,” explained Hatcher. “For instance, the average voter believes that a SNAP recipient receives more than three times what the actual amount of benefit is – $6 per day – and there is clear opposition to significantly cutting or reducing SNAP benefits. … Voters understand what’s at stake here. They make it clear just how unpopular it is in their minds for lawmakers to significantly scale back SNAP benefits, regardless of how that's done.”
To that end, FMI is dedicated to working with federal and state governments to keep SNAP “strong and viable for the long term,” she noted.
In providing a current picture of the typical SNAP recipient, Steve Markenson, FMI’s VP research and insights, observed: “It’s important to remember that a SNAP shopper is just like other shoppers trying to feed their families, which is evident in their purchase behavior over the last year. We know from recent data … that SNAP households’ baskets look the same as non-SNAP households’. In general, effectively looking at the shopper’s grocery basket across categories, SNAP and non-SNAP shopper households are only about three percentage points different in terms of the makeup of their total basket.”
FMI’s U.S. “Grocery Shopping Trends 2025” study consists of qualitative and quantitative research among a representative mix of 2,019 shoppers across the United States.
