grocery shopping

Most Consumers Spend Majority of Grocery Budget on Packaged Foods, CivicScience Finds

Consumers may talk big game about buying more fresh foods, but most still spend the majority of their grocery budget on packaged, prepared foods, new research from CivicScience reveals.

Only 20% of the 5,800 U.S. adults surveyed by the consumer research firm in the past year spent more than 50% of their grocery budget on fresh food. Rather, most shappers - 54% - spent a quarter or less of their food bill on fresh ingredients, according to CivicScience

June 23, 2015 | Source: Food Navigator-USA | by Elizabeth Crawford

Consumers may talk big game about buying more fresh foods, but most still spend the majority of their grocery budget on packaged, prepared foods, new research from CivicScience reveals.

Only 20% of the 5,800 U.S. adults surveyed by the consumer research firm in the past year spent more than 50% of their grocery budget on fresh food. Rather, most shappers – 54% – spent a quarter or less of their food bill on fresh ingredients, according to CivicScience.

This divide likely will close slightly in the future based on Symphony IRI’s prediction that sales of perishable foods will increade 3.9% to more than $142 billion in 2015. this is faster than the 2.1% predicted growth of other edibles, but also notably slower than the 5.3% increase in fresh food sales in 2014 – suggesting that food sold in the center of the store still attracts many shoppers.

But what type of shopper each segment of the store attracts varies widely, the CivicScience poll revealed.

Who shops the perimeter?
CivicScience found that consumers who shop the perimeter of the grocery store where fresh foods are stocked typically are 22% more likely to be women, 21% more likely to have a household income of more than $100,000 annually and more likely to be 30-44 years old compared to the general U.S. population.