After an extended period in isolation, it is not surprising that today’s consumers have emerged with a heightened awareness of diet, healthy eating choices, and overall wellness. “Keto” is currently one of the most popular food-related search terms across the United States. A ketogenic diet is a high fat, moderate protein, low carb diet that forces the body into a state of ketosis. In layman’s terms, ketosis turns your body into a superbly efficient, fat-burning machine.
Reports about the keto sector claim that given consumer interest’s exponential growth around snacks, the keto market size is projected to reach $14.69 billion by 2027. Inside the emerging category, meat snacks tend to be underperforming across the range of snack forms with consumer interest dropping 27 percent in the past 6 months.
So how are CHOMPS and FATTY, which are clean, keto-friendly beef jerky snacks, thriving despite the drop in category-wide consumer interest? Hint: it is not their clever names.
INSTANT SATISFACTION TRUMPS QUALITY
While consumers have become increasingly focused on allergy-friendly ingredient choices regarding meat snacks, consumer mentions from product reviews and social data show that satisfying extreme cravings and hunger are two of the quickest growing needs in consumer interest in the entire category of keto-friendly meat snacks. Both CHOMPS and FATTY meat sticks not only have a focus on allergy-free ingredients being used, but also tout the convenience to satisfy cravings fast.
On the other end of the scale, consumers are far less focused on getting high quality ingredients with consumer mentions at only 0.21%. Rather they are clearly more interested in allergen-free products that are convenient and quickly satisfy cravings.
MEAT-FREE MEAT STICKS
Although it sounds mutually exclusive, diving into the psychographics reveals that the top result is VEGAN with an increase in mentions of 425% and clearly has the biggest year on year growth rate. The consumer statistics show that the end user is predominantly male. From this data it can be ascertained that vegan-friendly meat alternative snacks that are keto-friendly, targeted to men, and focus on convenience have a high opportunity for success in a category which at first glance has an overall low opportunity score according to our AI.
Understanding the root causes and identifying key consumer needs warrants further investigation by brands who are interested in expanding their snack food range. To dive into the next layer or learn more about keto-friendly snacks, please request a demo on our homepage and we will get back to you. If you want to view our May 2021 webinar’s discussion on keto-friendly snacks, you can view the video here.