Ground-Breaking Study Uncovers Emerging Health Product Trends in Response to Childhood Obesity Problem

16/05/06 CHICAGO – Childhood obesity is quickly becoming an epidemic. If current trends continue, 50 percent of kids in the United States will be overweight by 2010. Manufacturers are responding by introducing more “better-for-you” products, and retailers are seeking knowledge to understand how to make the most of these new products at the shelf. Information Resources, Inc., has analyzed this issue closely and is offering a new study, “Healthy Kids Report: Understanding the Role of Better-for-You Products in Kid-Driven Food and Beverage Categories,” which uncovers emerging health trends for kid-driven food and beverage categories and assesses the performance and future impact of better-for-you products.

“Better-for-you innovation is driving volume growth in many of the most successful food and beverage categories,” said Thom Blischok, president of IRI Retail Solutions and Strategic Consulting. “To truly understand the emerging trends taking place today in these kid-focused categories, retailers need an in-depth, cross-category analysis that provides implications and recommendations that go beyond the narrowly focused individual category reviews they work with today. The ‘Healthy Kids Report’ provides the key action steps that retailers can implement to drive differentiation and to develop a successful platform for revitalizing the center store. No other research or consulting firm has produced the detailed, cross-category analysis included in this IRI report.”

Highlights of Study Findings
The IRI report includes an in-depth analysis of the better-for-you segment within 16 kid-driven food and beverage categories. It highlights the key growth trends and provides deep insight into which product attributes are working and which are not, and what it means to retailers. Here are just a few of the findings from the study that was driven by consumer panel data and analysis from IRI:

• The households with kids “spending index” is significantly higher than households without kids for many food and beverage categories. However, much of the marketing and variety focus in these categories is on adult tastes and preferences.
• Households with kids are a fast-growing, high-spending demographic that has driven 20 percent growth in key categories since 2002 versus 2 percent for households without kids. Learning to serve these households will be a key competitive advantage for retailers and food and beverage manufacturers.
• Within kid-driven categories, better-for-you products have grown a total of 31 percent since 2002 versus 7 percent for mainstream products. In these categories, better-for-you innovation is driving volume growth more than any other factor.
• Many of the most successful new products in the past three years promote healthier eating and drinking and are driving growth in these categories.
  

In addition, the findings in the “Healthy Kids Report” will help retailers excel in better-for-you product assortment and merchandising, facilitate collaboration with manufacturers in supporting in-store better-for-you initiatives and promotions, develop innovative private label products to successfully differentiate themselves and build shopper loyalty. In addition, retailers can communicate a better-for-you message to consumers and become a value-added source for consumer education.

“IRI is committed to leveraging all of its resources to bring actionable and thought-provoking insights to retailers,” added Blischok. “We are currently developing a new initiative that will empower retailers to address the industry’s burning issues, and wanted to give retailers a glimpse of this new program by offering our ground-breaking ‘Healthy Kids’ Report.”

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