Functional Foods Market Thriving

Grocery stores have become hunting grounds for healthful, functional foods and beverages that offer distinct wellness advantages beyond basic nutrition. Consumers are more proactive about their health and spurred the U.S. retail market for functional foods and beverages to a 6-percent gain with sales totaling almost $31 billion in 2008, according to market research publisher Packaged Facts in the new report, Functional Foods and Beverages in the U.S., 4th Edition. The market reached $29 billion in 2007.

“Consumers are reevaluating their health, nutrition, and lifestyle choices adopted years ago. This reevaluation includes considering the role functional foods and beverages could or should play in diets in order to avoid or help treat all kinds of health conditions,” said Tatjana Meerman, publisher of Packaged Facts. “This new, proactive approach is fundamentally different from the reactive tendencies of consumers in the past who only treated health problems after they arose.”

During the five-year period from 2003 to 2008, several functionally oriented food and beverage categories performed well, including yogurt, energy drinks, nutritional snacks and trail mixes, milk substitutes and soymilk, and refrigerated blended fruit drinks, among others. Packaged Facts projects that total U.S. retail sales of functional foods and beverages will continue to grow at a steady pace through 2013, and reach approximately $43 billion.

Though the market has not proven to be recession proof, it has advantages that could prevent it from being as vulnerable as most other markets. Namely, in the short term functional products may save consumers money since these foods and beverages carry nutrients that shoppers would otherwise seek in expensive nutritional supplements. While in the long run, functional products save consumers money on medical expenses by helping to prevent illness and chronic conditions. Functional Foods and Beverages in the U.S., 4th Edition examines the U.S. market for functional foods and beverages from all angles. It provides insight into key international markets, identifies global trends in new product introductions by geographic region and company, explores developing markets poised for growth, and profiles major marketers. An exclusive feature of the report is custom survey data from Packaged Facts’ February 2009 online poll of 2,600 U.S. adults, which was conducted to measure purchasing patterns, attitudes, and demographics specific to functional foods and beverages. Click here for further information.