Focus On Cooking Sauces & Meal Kits: 6 February

Focus On: Cooking Sauces & Meal Kits by Abbie Dawson

Download the synopsis here

Publishing: 6 February 2021

Advertising deadline: 22 January

Submissions deadline: 19 January

The Story

In the past year, a Mexican cooking sauce and meal kits brand has become market leader for the first time, usurping an Italian brand. And throughout the bestsellers list, oriental and Latin flavours are outgrowing more familiar European cuisines. What’s more, meal kits, pastes and other scratch cooking cheats are outperforming traditional slop from a jar sauces. Why? Who’s driving this and how? Who’s being left behind?

Key Themes

The impact of Covid: Other convenience categories, such as ready meals, were hit hard by lockdown, as many of us found ourselves with more time on our hands and less need for quick and easy meal solutions. What impact did Covid have on sales of cooking sauces and meal kits? What factors (such as the scaling back of promotions, supply challenges, changes in consumer behaviour etc) were behind this performance?

Scratch cooking cheats: It’s often said that lockdown has led to a rise in scratch cooking. What sort of dishes are people cooking? To what extent are consumers using pastes, rubs and meal kits and other short cuts when they’re cooking up a storm in the kitchen? Which brands are cashing in?

The next big thing: Mexican cuisine brand Old El Paso is now top of the bestsellers list, having usurped pasta sauce brand Dolmio. But what other types of cuisine are in strong growth? With restaurants shut, which lesser known cuisines (for example West African, Indonesian, Korean, Malaysian, etc) are about to have their day in the cooking aisles?

Kantar data: Using Kantar data and commentary, we explain the reasons behind the past year’s performance of the sub categories which make up this sector.

4 x innovations: we will profile four new products or ranges that have ideally not appeared in The Grocer before. We need launch date, rsp, and a hi-res picture of each.