Beef shoppers looking for variation and inspiration post-Covid

From a shopper insights point of view, Bord Bia’s Covid Indicators, 2020, the effects of Covid-19 resulted in an increase in the purchase of beef. Shoppers sought to replace their restaurant experience and beef, especially steak had an important role in delivering this.

After 18 months of scratch cooking, shoppers are now looking for more variation and inspiration. In the UK, Germany, Netherlands and Belgium, shoppers have wanted a change from beef. Dutch and UK shoppers are purchasing more shellfish and turkey as an alternative and in Italy and Ireland, shoppers are looking for something easier to cook than beef. Hence across the board beef shoppers need more inspiration to maintain current purchase levels. Showing examples of what the final meal could look like and highlighting the USPs of Irish origin and traceability could no doubt help inspire shoppers.

Ireland’s grass-fed messaging can help offer the variation shoppers are looking for and convince shoppers to pay extra for their beef. We are seeing the beginnings of a post-Covid bounce in concern for sustainability. Shoppers claim they intend to cut back on beef consumption in the next three years, driven primarily by concerns over animal welfare and the environmental impact of beef production. Grass-fed beef is more likely to drive future purchase of beef compared to this time last year, with three in ten beef shoppers in Sweden, UK and Germany saying they would be more likely to buy beef if it’s grass-fed, something Irish beef can claim and verify at scale.

For more information, please get in touch with Linda.madigan@bordbia.IE.

Every month, Bord Bia interviews 375 grocery shoppers in key European markets: Ireland, UK, Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, Italy and Sweden; in order to understand key dynamics around buying proteins. We have been collecting these insights since Autumn 2019, allowing us to reliably compare trends in consumption, purchase patterns and attitudes to the same period in the year previous. For more information, you can view the headline European report here.

This wave, in Sweden we see growing concerns over animal feed and environmental impact driving intention to reduce beef consumption, while grass-fed beef is closely associated with better quality beef by Swedish shoppers.