Lifting the lid on the frozen sector

Chris Hayward spoke at the British Frozen Food Federation's business conference on 7 March 2017 about the challenges and opportunities for the frozen sector.

His presentation looked at the performance of the market, which is flat overall. Increased frequency of purchase is driving growth, but this is being offset by lower volumes being purchased.

On the other hand, frozen food is only currently consumed at one meal in every seven, meaning there is plenty of headroom for growth. The evening meal is currently the focus – 44% of frozen foods are consumed at this time – so other mealtimes are clear opportunities.

In addition, consuming frozen foods for health reasons is on the rise - from 12.9% in 2013 to 17% currently.

In his speech Chris highlighted three levers of growth for manufacturers and retailers:

• Capitalise on premiumisation - Innovation in the category is helping change consumer perceptions of frozen and starting to address long-term category decline.
• Drive transactions - Giving shoppers more reasons to buy frozen foods more often is crucial to turning around current performance.
• Win with a 'health' proposition - None of the retailers 'own' health, yet consumer demand is up and frozen has a role to play in meeting this.