Tracking Trends in the Food and Beverage Industry
The food and beverage industry continues to navigate a complex landscape as constantly evolving macro forces — from concerns about the broader economy to the future of work — shape daily choices around eating and drinking. Leaders in food and beverage must stay informed on consumers’ changing attitudes and behaviors around grocery shopping, cooking and dining out.
Morning Consult is tracking consumer trends in the food and beverage industry through a monthly survey of U.S. adults.
Find a more detailed methodology for this tracker below.
Key Takeaways
Grocery prices, particularly the cost of meat, remain very concerning to consumers. Nearly half (48%) of consumers said they were “very concerned” about the cost of meat in March, consistent with the share who said the same in February 2024 and a year ago. Concerns about the cost of meat are the highest of any grocery category surveyed.
Delivery is the most popular method for online grocery shopping. Roughly 1 in 5 consumers (22%) said they ordered their groceries online and got them delivered in March 2024. This method is consistently more popular than both curbside (13%) and in store pickup (10%).
Weekly drinkers’ beverage of choice continues to be beer. About 1 in 5 (22%) of U.S. adults (21+) said they drank beer at least once a week in March 2024, higher than wine (19%), liquor (19%), craft beer (12%) and hard seltzer (9%).
Data Downloads
Pro+ subscribers are able to download the datasets that underpin Morning Consult Pro's reports and analysis. Contact us to get access.
How Consumers Get Groceries
Measuring Food Insecurity
Frequency of Using Restaurant Types
Trends in Alcohol Consumption Frequency
Trends in Alcohol Consumption Frequency by Gender
Consumers’ Healthy Eating and Drinking Habits
Source of This Data
Methodology
The Morning Consult Food and Beverage Monthly Trend Tracker relies on Morning Consult’s proprietary survey research capabilities. The interviews are conducted online, and the data are weighted to approximate a representative sample of U.S. adults based on gender, educational attainment, age, race and region. Results from the full survey have a monthly sample size of 2,200 U.S. adults and an unweighted margin of error of +/-2 percentage points.
About Morning Consult
Morning Consult is a global decision intelligence company changing how modern leaders make smarter, faster, better decisions. The company pairs its proprietary high-frequency data with applied artificial intelligence to better inform decisions on what people think and how they will act. Learn more at morningconsult.com.
The author would like to thank Emily Moquin and Megan Lynott for their contributions to this research.
Email [email protected] to speak with a member of the Morning Consult team.
