Become the Ally Stressed Millennial Parents Need in Supermarkets
By Al Heller, Contributing Editor, SupermarketGuru.com
Millennial Parents food-shop with high anxiety.
Their time constraints, financial stresses, healthful eating desires, and large physical distance from supportive relatives create openings for retail dietitians to connect and bond these big food spenders to specific supermarkets.
Stores that innovatively address their needs could earn a mother lode: 40% of Millennials already identify as parents (Think With Google) and 80% of Millennials expect to become parents by 2026, which will raise their count to 60 million moms and dads (CrowdTap). Millennial shoppers drive 30% of total U.S. retail sales (Accenture), and they’re becoming more pivotal as heads of larger households.
What’s on Millennial Parents’ minds, and how can retail dietitians help alleviate these pressures? Consider these insights and opportunities:
- 51% of Millennial Moms feel extremely challenged managing career and motherhood trade-offs; 85% say society doesn’t understand or support mothers well (2019 Motherly survey).
- Retail opportunity: Become an oasis in their time-pressed lives by making shopping easier with online delivery and pickup options that also engage with credible, clear information on package claims, suggestive selling of healthy products, “RD Picks” messaging, and better-for-you bundles of common foods and favorites from each customers’ purchase history.
- 46% willingly pay more for foods and beverages that offer more than basic nutrition and 56% use their smartphones to read about products while in stores, to spot the lack of additives and the presence of functional ingredients (IRI).
- Retail opportunity: Engage shoppers before their store trip by partnering with your communications team to create website and social media pages that highlight new products and the health benefits they provide. Curate lists of better-for-you items young families may want to try that offer satisfying taste adventures and can make meals at home more fun.
- 52% closely monitor their children’s diet (Millennial Marketing). Three-quarters of Millennial moms pack lunches for their kids they believe are more nutritious than what they ate as children and more than one-third opt for organic produce (Produce for Better Health Foundation).
- Retail opportunity: Offer convenient bundles of BFY lunch foods and portable snacks that will save shoppers time and earn higher margins.
- Half of U.S. Millennials believe they eat healthier than the average consumer (Mintel). With or without children, Millennials and Gen Zs will stay committed to fresh, less processed foods and organics (NPD).
- Retail opportunity: Suggest game-like ways for parents to impart their own healthy food priorities to their Mini-Mes and turn shopping into a rewarding learning experience the kids enjoy. How about blind taste tests or treasure hunt games?
- 87% say their children influence purchases (NRF).
- Retail opportunity: Display healthy foods prominently so they’re ultra-convenient and easy for kids to select too. Show BFY snacks near the front of the store or the dietitian area so you can answer questions. On weekday afternoons, wheel a display of “RD-Approved” prepared meals for nutritious quick dinner solutions.
- Millennial Parents living far distances from relatives rely on store-led conveniences to help cope with day-to-day pressures.
- Retail opportunity: Help them align experiential desires with quick and easy choices available. Dietitian-led displays, new product flow, messaging and education can turn the store into the local ally they desperately need.
Read our companion story on communicating better with Millennial Parents in the next issue of the RDBA E-Weekly.
