While companies like Impossible Foods or Beyond Meat keep busy with the development of new plant-based alternatives, a significant part of consumers still enjoy their day-to-day meat menus. Although nutrition and the overall direction of diets might eventually change, things still look good for manufacturers of frozen meat and poultry products.
According to the American Meat Institute, an estimated 95% of Americans make meat or poultry a regular part of their balanced diet. Thanks to its affordability, in 2019 Americans spend just 9.5% of disposable income on all food purchases, and they spend 1.4% of their disposable personal income on meat and poultry products. The percent of disposable income per capita spent on food to be consumed at home was only 4.8% of per capita disposable income, while the average in high income countries around the globe is 7.7%. On an annual basis, meat packers transform 33.6 million head of cattle, 587,000 calves, 129.9 million hogs and 2.23 million sheep and lambs into more than 55 billion pounds of beef, pork, lamb and veal. Meanwhile, poultry processors transform 9.34 billion chickens and 227.6 million turkeys into more than 50 billion pounds of chicken and
turkey products. In 2019, the industry exported 3.02 billion pounds of beef and 6.3 billion pounds of pork to nations around the world. Poultry companies exported 7.2 billion pounds of chicken products and nearly 640 million pounds of turkey. In the past year, US beef has been exported to 135 countries, US pork has been shipped to 124 countries, and US chicken was exported to 165 countries. According to Euromonitor figures, 2020 brought a visible increase in spending for US consumers: frozen processed meat sales rose by 20.1% (+2.4% in 2019 vs. 2018), while sales of frozen processed red meat increased by 16.1% (+0.7% in 2019 vs. 2018). Frozen processed poultry saw the highest growth (22.3%). Sales were much more stable in Eastern Europe: frozen processed meat was up by 7.2% when compared to 2019, frozen processed red meat was up by 6.9% and frozen processed poultry grew by 7.6%. In Western Europe, Euromonitor data shows that frozen processed red meat, of which consumption had decreased in 2019 vs. 2018 (-0.1%), saw a growth of 5.1% in 2020. The value is a little higher for frozen processed meat (+6.1%) and frozen processed poultry (+7.1%).
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