NPD Group: Market for plant-based meat alternatives still evolving
The 27 million consumers claiming to follow a plant-based diet aren’t necessarily consuming plant-based dairy and meat alternatives.
In recent years, there has been a lot of expansion and innovation surrounding plant-based dairy and meat alternatives in the United States, even with dairy and animal-protein manufacturers finding ways to enter the space, but the market’s potential is still being determined. According to The NPD Group, Chicago, the market for plant-based alternatives is still evolving, as consumers begin to leverage these items due to food allergies or the search for more healthful options.
A logical conclusion to the plant-based alternatives buzz is that more people are living vegan (avoids all animal products), vegetarian (avoids meat products) or flexible vegetarian (mainly vegetarian with some exceptions) lifestyles. However, NPD Group’s ongoing tracking of eating attitudes and behaviors states that very few consumers follow the most restrictive vegan/ vegetarian diets. Only 1% of the population claims to be vegan or vegetarian, and 8% say they are flexible vegetarians, which means about 27 million shoppers actually claim to follow a plant-based diet such as vegan, vegetarian or flexible vegetarian.