How snacking is upending mealtimes — and the entire industry

By Carolyn Heneghan | March 31, 2016

Dive Brief:

• Whether "snackification" is the new industry buzzword is up for debate, but there's no denying that snacking has turned traditional eating occasions upside-down through an emphasis on serving size and convenience.
• Breakfast makers have turned to snacking as a way to expand breakfast foods' reach beyond the morning hours, particularly cereal brands and, most recently, Greek yogurt. Snack-friendly breakfast biscuits are currently a disruptive, fast-rising category in the U.S. imported by Mondelez and since adopted by General Mills, Kellogg, Post, Snyder's-Lance, and PepsiCo.
• About 83% of consumers are snacking at least once a day in 2016, 73% reported doing so in 2014, according to new research from Technomic. That includes 53% of consumers reporting that they snack between meals, as compared to 41% in 2014. 

Dive Insight:

Snacking is being positioned as a potential savior for certain floundering categories, particularly cereal, and categories that are still strong but have seen growth taper off, like Greek yogurt.

Kellogg is appealing to millennials who want to indulge on a nostalgic treat at all times of day by creating grab-and-go containers for Frosted Flakes and Special K. Last year, the company ran a spot depicting two parents playing video games and snacking on Froot Loops after putting the kids to bed. Sales of Froot Loops saw a 2.5% uptick thereafter.

Chobani announced a line of Greek yogurt-based dips that would reposition Greek yogurt outside of breakfast time.

But snacking is poised to benefit categories beyond traditional breakfast foods. Protein snacks offer consumers functionality and can serve as meal replacements on the go. Companies like Hormel and Tyson have developed their own meat-based snacks to fill that need, while jerky snackssaw double digit growth in 2015. And though candy is already a snack, confectioners like Hershey havedeveloped chocolate-filled snack mixes and the Brookside snacks line. Hershey also expanded distribution for better-for-you snacks maker SoFit earlier this year and acquiredKrave jerky last year.

Snacking is also cross-generational, with baby boomers actually snacking more than millennials, according to recent research from The NPD Group.