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FROM THE DESK OF ROBERT CARTER<br />
DINNER ON DEMAND<br />
Canadians are hungry for meal-kit delivery services<br />
iSTOCK.COM/SILVERKBLACK [COUPLE LOOKING INTO BOX]<br />
If there’s one thing Canadians have in<br />
common, it’s the daily dilemma of figuring<br />
out what’s for dinner. Now, more<br />
than ever, time-starved Canadians are left<br />
scrambling to serve up a nutritious, delicious<br />
meal at the end of the day.<br />
The meal-kit industry aims to solve this<br />
problem by providing a subscription service<br />
that sends customers pre-portioned (and<br />
sometimes partially prepared) food ingredients<br />
and recipes to prepare home-cooked<br />
meals that are convenient, healthy and —<br />
most importantly — delicious.<br />
MEAL KITS — A QUICKLY<br />
EMERGING SEGMENT<br />
11% Have tried it for under 12 months<br />
2% Have tried it for more than 12 months<br />
42% Interested in trying<br />
30% Not interested in trying<br />
16% Not aware of the service<br />
The meal-kit industry in Canada has<br />
roughly doubled since 2014 and is expected<br />
to exceed $400 million in the next year as<br />
the segment continues to experience dramatic<br />
growth. Services such as Chefs Plate,<br />
Goodfood and Hello Fresh offer hectic households<br />
another option for solving the nightly<br />
dinner dilemma. Furthermore, the awareness<br />
of meal kits and the adoption rate of usage<br />
continue to grow as Canadians seek more<br />
convenient meal solutions.<br />
According to a recent report by The NPD<br />
Group, 13 per cent of Canadians have used<br />
meal kits at some point and 11 per cent have<br />
used meal kits in the past year. Among nonusers,<br />
interest in meal kits is growing, with 42<br />
per cent of Canadians claiming they have an<br />
interest in trying a meal kit.<br />
Not surprisingly, convenience is the key<br />
purchase motivator when it comes to mealkit<br />
users — 67 per cent of current users feel<br />
their lives are hectic and rushed compared to<br />
42 per cent of non-users. Meal-kit users are<br />
also twice as likely to cite convenience as an<br />
important purchase factor.<br />
Households with children have also been<br />
early adopters of meal kits, with 20 per cent<br />
having tried them at least once. In addition,<br />
the industry seems to be capitalizing on spontaneity,<br />
as 58 per cent of users decide to purchase<br />
a meal kits same day.<br />
Interestingly, three-out-of-five current<br />
meal-kit users (62 per cent) are male, while 38<br />
per cent are female. Furthermore, male users<br />
also expressed intention to use a meal-kit service<br />
more frequently in the next six months<br />
compared to female users (48 per cent compared<br />
to 39 per cent). Males are also a more<br />
consistent user, with 68 per cent of those<br />
using a meal kit in the past year still currently<br />
using a service, compared to only 48 per cent<br />
of women.<br />
Regardless of who is buying, current users<br />
seem to be highly satisfied with meal-kit<br />
services, with more than 91 per cent indicating<br />
they were very or extremely satisfied with<br />
their meal kit. When it comes to lapsed users,<br />
the highest reason users were no longer using<br />
the meal-kit service was due to the perception<br />
of the kits being too expensive, with 52<br />
per cent expressing this as a key reason for no<br />
longer using mea-kit services. FH<br />
Robert Carter is industry<br />
expert, Foodservice, with<br />
the NPD Group Inc. He can be<br />
reached at robert.carter@<br />
npd.com for questions<br />
regarding the latest trends<br />
and their impact on the<br />
foodservice business.<br />
FOODSERVICEANDHOSPITALITY.COM<br />
DECEMBER 2018 FOODSERVICE AND HOSPITALITY 9
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