Seizing on top sellers

To be fair, it’s not only grill-ready steaks or a pork shoulder waiting to be turned into carnitas that can inspire dinner daydreams. Consumers’ most popular picks in the meat department can win fresh attention with thoughtful merchandising and promotion, Roerink and Parker say.

Take meat grinds. For the 52 weeks ended in late October, both ground beef and ground chicken bucked the meat department’s trend of declining pound sales, posting pound gains of 0.2% and nearly 15%, respectively, over the year prior, according to Circana. Their versatility and lower price per pound relative to other meat choices cements their star status, but “nobody wants to eat the same thing again and again,” says Roerink.

“Some people are really good at figuring out, ‘I want to eat ground beef; what else am I going to do with it?’” she notes. But others aren’t. “Left to our own devices, we all have our go-to meals,” Roerink says. The opportunity for retailers is to serve up easy meal ideas that may be inspired by these go-tos but that offer a seasonal spin or other out-of-the-ordinary preparation.

“I think that recipe where you have the routine item but with a twist, I think there's a big opportunity with that,” Roerink says, whether it’s a pasta sauce, meatballs or a skillet meal, for example.

Chicken has been another strong performer in 2023 and in the second half of the year especially, as prices have cooled following an avian-influenza-influenced spike last year. Pound sales for fresh chicken in October were up over both the year-ago period and for the 52 weeks ended Oct. 29 over the prior year. (Dollar sales vs. October 2022 were down 3.3% thanks to deflation.)

But keeping momentum going—and keeping customers coming back to Store A vs. Store B for their everyday meal-making needs—demands some creative promotion beyond price cuts, Parker says. A big part of that is helping consumers see how they can use up that pound of ground beef or three-pack of pork chops—how many meals it can easily turn into, she says.

This is especially true for younger consumers, many of whom have embraced the idea of weekend meal prep for the week ahead (and are turning to TikTok, Instagram and other social platforms for quick tutorials and recipe ideas for doing so). Tapping into a desire for one-and-done meal prep and rising interest across demographic groups in reducing food waste can be a powerful purchase motivator, she suggests. More than two in five consumers surveyed by Circana this fall said they are more conscious than they were earlier in 2023 about using up fresh food before it goes bad, and around the same share, 42%, said they want to use leftovers more often for dinner and lunch occasions.