Daily Research News Online no. 2517 - Fast Food Chains Saving the Salad?

Fast Food Chains Saving the Salad?

August 1 2003

Orders for salads at US restaurants, including side and main dish salads, decreased between June 2002 and May 2003 according to research from the NPD Group whose 'Annual Eating Patterns in America' will be published in October. However, main dish salads are enjoying a renaissance in a seemingly unlikely quarter, fast food restaurants.

Orders for main dish salads at fast food restaurants grew 12 per cent compared to the same time a year earlier, according to NPD. Main dish salads in all establishments saw a slight rise in orders - 2% - and the overall decline is down to a fall in side salad orders.

The numbers reflect a shift in where and how Americans are getting their salads, rather than an overall increase in salad eating, according to author Harry Balzer, a Vice President of the NPD Group. 'We're not eating a lot more salads, but we are getting them at new places - fast-food restaurants', he explains. In fact, salad consumption at home is down too.

Four percent of all restaurant orders included salad as a main dish in 2002, compared to seven percent in 1989, according to the 17th Annual EPA. 'Interestingly, a lot of fast-food restaurants had salad bars in the 1980s, and then took them out in the 1990s', says Balzer. 'We've got a long way to go to get back to those 'Salad Days', but the availability of entr�e salads at fast food restaurants is sparking renewed interest in salads'.

The 18th Annual Eating Patterns in America will be available in October from NPD Foodworld(r), a division of The NPD Group. The seminal work covers what consumers are eating, where they buy their food and beverages, who prepares meals, what appliances are used, the most popular foods at each meal, what's hot in the restaurant industry, as well as trends in diet, nutrition and concerns about health and food safety. It also looks at consumers' attitudes and behaviours about food in home and away from home.

Editorial Comment
Presumably, if salad consumption at fast food joints continues to grow and the current farcical spate of law suits against restaurants with the audacity to actually promote their products to poor unsuspecting consumers does not abate, we shall one day see a claim for Irritable Bowel Syndrome brought on by a lifetime surfeit of crispy shredded lettuce.

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas unless otherwise stated.