2023 December Board Book

Business Development, December 2023

Domestic Retail

The first chart below is for TTL US, the second is California. On the left is latest 52 weeks, with the timeframe progressively shorter until the last column which is the last 4 weeks, through 10-08-23.

For the latest 52 weeks, California is trending similar to, but slightly behind the TTL US. For Total US, most categories are showing positive trends. California cheese and butter and cottage cheese trends are positive. Conversely though, California ice cream and novelties are declining, and ice cream more so than national trends. The dairy growth story for the year is definitely cottage cheese. The twelve and four week trends are very strong for TTL US and CA, though seem to be slowing a bit. By the next report, we should have a better idea if the trend has reached its peak. E-commerce: As expected, the summer months saw more contractions to grocery e-commerce dollars as families big and small found themselves traveling, eating out more, etc. As September rolled around, the declines in grocery e-commerce softened just a bit though still down 3.1% versus this time last year. This contraction is driven by declines in order frequency and decreases in spend per order. Despite these changes, there are still more people purchasing groceries online (+11% versus September 2022). Mass is the largest beneficiary of this increase of shoppers, up 20%, versus Supermarkets up just 1%.