Where You Fit On The Good Food Consumer Spectrum

by Bob Benenson, FamilyFarmed

[FamilyFarmed is proud to share the second installment of our new Good Food Insights series in partnership with New Hope Network, producer of industry-leading annual events that include the Natural Product Expos (West and East) and the Esca Bona thought leadership conference (which is the platform for the Insights series). This series of articles that will unpack the dynamics driving Good Food. In coming months this series will feature portraits of the national Good Food landscape and individual industry sectors, and we will continue to back those insights up with facts provided through our partnership with SPINS, the leading provider of retail consumer insights, analytics reporting and consulting services for the natural, organic and specialty products industry.

This Insights article, first published by New Hope Network on June 1, discusses the seven consumer segments — from True Believers to Resistant Non-Believers — identified in the SPINS/IRI NaturaLink study of the market for natural and organic products. Insights article will be published on a monthly basis beginning in July.]

This segmentation is the result of the NaturaLink study, produced by SPINS—the leading provider of retail consumer insights, analytics reporting and consulting services for the natural, organic and specialty products industry—and IRi, which uses big data and opinion research to provide insights and predictive analysis across the business spectrum. NaturaLink segmentation divides the U.S. population into seven distinct segments based on their affinity, attitudes and purchase behavior toward natural and organic products.

 

If so, you are a member of the core constituency for natural and organic that makes up 20 percent of U.S. households, according to NaturaLink research. Natural and organic products (not just food, but also personal and home care items) are such priorities for these consumers that their market clout is nearly double its population share: A fifth of all households, the core buyers, are responsible for slightly more than two-fifths of natural and organic sales.

Knight says the research provides some support for the perception that younger consumers are major drivers behind the quickening rise of the good food movement… but only to a point. He noted that the primary age range for True Believers is 25 to 44. But he notes that the average age of Enlightened Environmentalists is 55: “They are the Baby Boomers, and they want to use products that are good for the planet and healthy for you.”

 

While these core groups are the engines for the rapid growth in good food, Knight said there is great potential for future sales in the middle groups: Healthy Realists and Strapped Seekers. Consumers in both of these aspirational groups report an elevated interest in more natural and organic products, but face obstacles.

Healthy Realists (13 percent of households) tend to be college-educated families for whom convenience is a major issue, and they say their biggest hindrance is not enough availability of natural/organic options at their local store. “They are going to Kroger and buying their products. They’re not going to make the extra trip to go to a Whole Foods,” Knight said, “and they are more likely to start buying good food for their kids before they buy it for themselves.”

As the label Strapped Seekers suggests, expense is a big issue for this other aspirational group (11 percent of households). The first grouping that is not primarily college grads, Strapped Seekers have a median income of $45,000—less than half that of the True Believers.

So what about those lower-participation groupings, who make up more than half of all households: Indifferent Traditionalists (24 percent), Struggling Switchers (19 percent) and Resistant Non-Believers (14 percent)? There is data in the NaturaLink study that might give good food advocates hope for new converts: It found that 92 percent of all households have purchased products that have at least 70 percent organic content.

But Knight notes that there are big differences between these groups and the others, not only in volume of natural and organic purchases, but in their intentionality.

“There’s an organic item, maybe it’s on sale at a Walmart,” Knight said. “It’s good that there’s more accessibility for the product. But is it someone who really cares that much and is going to keep coming back and repeating?”

FamilyFarmed is proud to partner with New Hope Network on this series of articles that will unpack the dynamics driving good food. In coming months this series will feature portraits of the national good food landscape and individual industry sectors, and we will continue to back those insights up with facts provided through our partnership with SPINS.