2022 December Board Book

Processor Partnerships

Dairy in Retail

Dairy Products are Taking the Greatest Hit from Inflation

While overall dollar-weighted average food prices are up an average of 13.3% versus a year ago, dairy products have taken the greatest increases, with prices escalating over 21% versus a year ago. This is likely due to the high cost of fuel - when applied to heavy products such as milk and/or ice cream, the added freight cost is spread among fewer units when shipped. That combined with higher resin costs, affecting packaging and milk being the highest volume dairy product, drives the entire category average up. The good news here is even though dairy product inflation was up 2.1% for the month of October versus September, the overall volume sales versus a year ago is only down 1%, the lowest decrease of all the categories listed below. People are looking for high nutrition and dairy offers this at a value to other sources of protein and essential vitamins.

Private Label Dominates Dairy Category and Category Growth

The chart on the left side below illustrates the percentage of store brands products purchased each dairy category (share of market) with milk, cheese and whipping cream at 50% or more. The chart on the right illustrates the growth of store brand dairy versus national brand dairy for