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The popularity of both quick service and breakfast continues to grow, and snacking now occurs more often in midmorning than at night, NPD found. Brown-bag lunches also are on the rise, and supermarkets are entrenched in the foodservice business.
“The current economic condition just exposes what’s been going on for the last [six or seven] years,” said Harry Balzer, vice president of the Port Washington, N.Y.-based market research firm. “We’re just starting to notice. People are not using restaurants less, they’re using restaurants differently.”
The total number of meals purchased at restaurants has not increased since 2000, but where consumers are eating out has shifted, according to NPD. Seventy-seven percent of all restaurant meals now come from fast-food restaurants, a new high. Visits to full-service restaurants, where servers are relied upon, are on the wane.
Changes in consumers’ eating patterns are impacting all dayparts, but the biggest shift is occurring at dinner, NPD found. According to NPD, the industry’s dinner business, both on- and off-premise, has not grown since 2000. Instead, consumers are buying more ready-to-eat meals from supermarkets.
When consumers do visit a restaurant for dinner, their top choice is quick service. Nonetheless, the segment is not increasing its share of the dinner occasion as it is at breakfast and lunch. The segment’s share of dinner meals has been largely flat since 2002, capturing a 64-percent to 65-percent share. In contrast, quick service’s share of breakfast has been steadily growing since 2002. In the year ended in February, the segment captured an 83-percent share of breakfast, up from 78 percent in 2002. Quick-service lunch has grown just slightly in the past five years, capturing a 77-percent share in the year ended in February, up from 75 percent in 2002.
Big changes are happening during the breakfast daypart, too. Consumers who once skipped breakfast are now eating more in the morning, and what they choose to eat is more healthful, according to NPD. Nearly half of all breakfast items consumed are labeled as better-for-you items, NPD found. In addition, while consumers are still interested in purchasing products with reduced ingredients, such as lower sodium or fat, now they are also buying more products with added nutritional ingredients, such as probiotics and omega-3 fatty acids.
More than 70 percent of breakfasts still are consumed in-home, but those purchased at restaurants increasingly are eaten off-premise. According to NPD, for every breakfast eaten in a restaurant, two are eaten outside of the restaurant. Also, more of those eaten outside of restaurants are being eaten in cars.
“The breakfast market is not growing on sit-down, [it’s] exclusively takeout,” Balzer said. “[Consumers want a] quick, easy-to-consume and inexpensive meal.”
Ready-to-eat cereal remains the most popular in-home breakfast item, but consumers are not eating more of it. Instead, NPD found, consumers are eating more yogurt and nutrition bars for their morning meal. Because these are not filling foods, a growing number of consumers also are purchasing additional items from restaurants later in the morning, NPD found.
That second breakfast is, at least in part, driving a shift in the way Americans snack, Balzer said. While consumers aren’t eating more snacks, they are eating different types of snacks at different times. Morning snacking is on the rise, while evening snacking is decreasing. Popcorn and chips once eaten later in the day are being replaced by more healthful items, such as such as fruit, nuts, seeds, yogurt and nutrition bars.
Restaurants have been capturing more of consumers’ snack occasions and are helping to alter consumers’ definition of snacks, NPD found.
“The word ‘snack’ is expanding,” Balzer said. “Beverages, hamburgers, sandwiches, wraps [are] now called a snack.”
This article mainly talks about how more and more people are not going out to as much as they use to and instead they are ordering takeout or buying already prepared food from supermarkets. It also talks about how more people are snacking mid morning to afternoon rather then at night.
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