Research carried out by the Institute of Grocery Distribution (IGD) shows that the food-to-go market in the UK offers significant opportunities for growth. The IGD is anticipating the market to be worth £16.1 billion in 2016 - an increase of 6.8 % in the last year.
“There are some clear development opportunities for food-to-go in the UK, driven by the growth of little and often shopping, the rise in popularity of street food and coffee culture, and shoppers’ increasingly flexible lifestyles”, IGD Chief executive Joanne Denney-Finch said.
The IGD analysed five different market segments: coffee specialists, quick service restaurants, food-to-go specialists, super / hypermarkets and convenience / forecourt retailers.
New lunchtime options and new, or seasonal, ranges of healthier foods are the main areas marked for potential growth. Lunch, snacks and drinks are the most frequently bought foods ‘on the go’: 70% of shoppers surveyed said they’d bought lunch in the last month - 45% had bought a snack or drink.
© 2016 European Supermarket Magazine – your source for the latest retail news. Article by Martha Sparrius. To subscribe to ESM: The European Supermarket Magazine, click here.
