Post-Holiday: nesting with comfort foods

The quick transition from holiday to post-holiday mindset presents the sharpest contrast of the year for consumers. But it is a positive shift, with people moving from a time of emotional stress and social flux to a more predictable regimen of rules and routines.

Families nest in this period with healthful, nourishing and comfort foods in mind. They focus on warm, hearty meals that sustain and help them resist colds and flu. These meals may take longer to prepare, but people do spend more time at home during this season, especially in colder climates.

In practical terms, stews, casseroles and scratch cooking move to the top burner. Also central now: people experiment with fresh takes on healthy foods to offset any winter blahs, and counter dietary excesses of the holidays with lower-fat, lower-calorie, portion-controlled meals.

A savings mentality rules in the wake of holiday budget excesses. This carries over into food buying, where value pricing is especially important, and into home-based activities, where families are content having fun together under one roof.

Using these insights, retailers can improve their consumer appeals by underscoring an enduring health message (not just a call to dieters), a value and savings message, and reinforcing the idea that food can be an integral part of the family fun, suggests Tim Miller, senior director of shopper insights at ConAgra Foods.

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
  
• 
  

Relieving childhood hunger, together

The 2011 Child Hunger Ends Here (CHEH) campaign will merge consumers, retailers and ConAgra Foods brands in a large-scale effort to stem a stark problem worsened by the nation's economy: nearly one in four kids...

Read Full Story

ReadySetEat™ website solves weeknight dinner dilemmas

Meal planners in the 57 percent of households making their dinner decisions within an hour before mealtime* will definitely appreciate the new website ConAgra Foods launched Jan. 4...

Read Full Story

A full-year roadmap to weeknight dinners

Food retailers can gain plenty — up to $700 million in incremental sales, in fact — by helping households ease the weeknight dinner burden. And it could be as simple as getting each household in the U.S. to buy...

Read Full Story

• Ultra-Convenient Meals, SNAP Strategies, Kids in the Kitchen, and Holiday
• Canned Tomatoes: A Total-Store Sales Engine
• Driving Growth in Frozens
• Family Fun Spices Up October

Retailers can provide season-focused shopper solutions for Mom by using ConAgra Foods' gathered insights about Weeknight Dinner Planning throughout the year.

Watch this Video

View Video Archive

Sourcing: Target: 35 Dinners Taken Home from Restaurant/person/year Source: NPD 24th Annual Eating Patterns in America, 2009 Population estimate, 2011: 313,232,000  Source: US Census Bureau Cost of In-Home Dinner from Grocery Store: $2.50   Source: Various estimates: NPD cost of in-home meal ($2.37); The Simpledollar.com # of US Groc Stores, $2MM+:  36,000   Source: Progressive Grocer CAG Share of Center Store: 3.43^{2   1}$2MM+ Supermarket   ²IRI 52 Weeks ending 3/29/10

Cold Comfort

Retailers are putting calorie-laden frozen comfort foods on ice, and appealing instead to consumers' desire for healthier convenience meals.

Comfort Foods

Food Bazaar is distributing nutritional pamphlets geared especially to Hispanics. Called "Camino Magico' and provided by the Latino Nutrition Coalition, the brochures include healthy recipes and explain how to read nutrition labels.

Stayin' Alive

Retailers develop their own rescue plans to lighten the recession's toll on wellness sales.