Sustainability is on the minds of many consumers and they are bringing the topic to both retailers’ attention and product assortments. Sustainability—the avoidance of the depletion of natural resources in order to maintain an ecological balance, according to research firm The NPD Group’s Health Aspirations & Behavioral Tracking Service—also is used in a broader sense to…
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Stats: Meal Kits and Online Grocery Shopping Boost Home Cooking
Any renewed interest in home cooking rather than eating out is good news for kitchenware retailers. And, thanks to the growth in meal kits and online grocery shopping, more people are cooking meals at home these days. In fact, more than half of U.S. adults claim they really enjoy cooking (53%) and more than a third consider the kitchen to be the most important room in…
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Stats: Specialty Cheese Market Expected to Grow
Although it is, ahem, ripe, the market for specialty cheese, while mature, is still expected to grow. Which is good news for those independent retailers who stock bries, blues and cheddars. According to the U.S. Food Market Outlook 2019, a report released by the market research firm Packaged Facts, retail dollar sales of the U.S. natural and specialty cheese market reached…
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Stats: NPD Details What is Selling at Retail
The NPD Group’s home division presented its sixth annual industry performance awards during the International Home & Housewares Show this past March. Awards were given to small appliance and housewares (non-electric) brands with the largest increase in U.S. market share in 2018, compared to 2017, according to dollar sales from NPD’s Retail Tracking Service. Three…
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Stats: Americans Still on Facebook
As independent specialty retailers work to build their social media outreach along a variety of platforms, Facebook continues to be the place to go to reach the most consumers. According to the latest surveys from the Pew Research Center, even with Facebook’s recent scandals, Americans are using the social media site in droves. Here is a primer on some of the latest…
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Stats: Moving From Cash
Americans are growing less reliant on cash currency, with 1-in-3 Americans last year opting out of using cash for spending during a typical week, according to a recent Pew Research Center study. Those who made more than $75,000 a year were more likely to eschew cash for their typical weekly purchases, compared with people who made less than $30,000. Which means that…
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Stats: Politics Plays Role in Shopping
When former Speaker of the House Thomas “Tip” O’Neill coined the phrase “All politics is local,” he didn’t know it at the time, but he could have been talking about retailing. According to a recent survey conducted by the NPD Group, consumers are paying closer attention than ever to politics these days and it is changing the way they shop. In a recent a survey, “The Holiday…
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Stats: Foodies of the Future Unite
When it comes to where food trends are going, it is not just Millennials who are shaping eating patterns. According to a new study, a group of consumers that crosses demographic lines is shaping the future of food. Meet “Gen Food.” The report released by FleishmanHillard at the Culinary Institute of America’s re-Think Food conference, shows when it comes to food and…
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Stats: Shopping Small is Growing
It’s almost Shop Small Season. American Express launched Small Business Saturday in 2010 as a marketing effort to boost both its business and small, local retailers at a time when the industry was in recession. The idea was to give those retailers support, after the Black Friday mass market retail rush, by promoting the Saturday after Thanksgiving as a time for more leisurely…
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