HEALTHY EATING TRENDS: INNOVATIVE SOLUTIONS TO EVOLVING CONSUMER NEEDS
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
JANUARY 2006

IRI's Times & Trends highlights new developments and critical events across all major CPG categories and channels, providing powerful benchmarking data to help guide your strategic decisions. This issue provides an in-depth analysis of healthy eating trends and the industry’s response to evolving consumer needs through innovative solutions.

This free summary is also accessible via the GMA Web site  at http://www.gmabrands.com/publications/gmairi.cfm

Introduction

The past few years have been marked by an extraordinary level of innovation across CPG food and beverage categories in an effort to deliver against consumer health and wellness needs.

The reformulation of products to remove trans fats, creation of new products that provide whole grain benefits without sacrificing taste, and introduction of innovative packaging to help consumers manage caloric intake have enabled the industry to take a huge leap forward in providing healthier alternatives to consumers. Several new “healthful” product introductions have been embraced by consumers – illustrating the strong market potential.

As leading CPG marketers recognize, however, translating “better for you” initiatives into profitable sales growth requires an understanding of the complexities of consumer eating behavior and ongoing identification and monitoring of untapped opportunities.

This report is designed to help CPG manufacturers and retailers see profitable new health-oriented growth opportunities, act on these opportunities through continued innovation and win at the shelf.
 

KEY FINDINGS

Consumers have embraced many “healthful” new products, but overall dietary changes have been slow and gradual. New products enabling consumers to make easy improvements in their diets, such as Nabisco 100 Calorie Packs and Sara Lee Heart Healthy Bread, have met with strong success and illustrate the market potential for convenient, healthy solutions. However, over half of consumers continue to take a haphazard approach to healthy eating, and the majority of consumers continue to balance healthful and indulgent foods in their diets.

Consumers with health conditions manage their diets more aggressively than mainstream consumers. While the number-one reason for controlling diet is weight management, sizable sub-segments of consumers are managing their diets to control other specific health conditions such as high cholesterol, diabetes and heart conditions. These segments represent strong target markets for healthier products and are poised for substantial growth as Boomers age and face increased incidence of chronic disease.

“Light” product alternatives, or those with weight management benefits, offer strong growth potential in otherwise slow/no growth markets. Excluding low carb options, “light” weight management products significantly outpaced total category sales growth across the snack, dessert, beverage and dairy product segments. Among most of these categories, light products represent a small proportion of sales – indicating strong continued upside potential.

The whole grain market is poised for additional growth. While nearly half of all consumers are trying to include whole grains in their diets, the vast majority are not eating the recommended three servings per day. Products that offer whole grain goodness without sacrificing taste and/or texture will be well-received by consumers – particularly those over age 50.

 

Source: IRI's Times & Trends Reports
Information Resources, Inc. (IRI) is the world’s leading provider of enterprise market information solutions and services to the consumer packaged goods (CPG), retail, and healthcare industries.