While sales of food for at-home consumption at $147.3 billion totaled over 50% more than eating and drinking place sales in the first two months of 2015 according to The Food Institute, eating and drinking places’ share of overall food sales did increase 1.5 percentage points in the two month period at the expense of at-home food sales. (See our earlier blog here detailing at-home food consumption.)
Although grocery sales will almost certainly continue to outpace eating out sales for the foreseeable future, people are eating away from home more. During the first two months of 2015, grocery sales accounted for 61.1% of all food sales while compared to 62.6% a year earlier – down 1.5%. Eating and drinking places’ share meanwhile, rose 1.5% to 38.9%. And delving a bit deeper, The Food Institute finds that consumers are spending more at both full service restaurants and limited outlets, including fast-food.
In the future, we will break down grocery and away-from-home food sales to portray how the business is trending overall, to give a much greater perspective on the entire business. We welcome your comments on this new analysis via email to questions@foodinstitute.com, or via comments below.