“The numbers around eating alone are nothing short of revelatory,” adds Hartman Group, noting that 53% of breakfasts, 45% of lunches and 24% of dinners are eaten alone, making solitary eating “a normal part of modern life.”
As household sizes are getting smaller, meanwhile, “mealtime ritual is harder to sustain interest in,” adds Hartman Group, which stresses that eating alone is not necessarily a miserable and joyless experience, but something many consumers take great pleasure in.
“The top reasons consumers use alone eating is to recharge and indulge in ‘me time’… Another common development is the household where on many occasions everybody eats alone…"
The pantry and kitchen serve as a sort of 24-hour commissary
“Part of this is driven by so-called ‘hectic’ schedules and the increasing fragmentation of daily life, but in many other cases this happens simply by choice.
"The pantry and kitchen serve as a sort of 24-hour commissary for all to access at will, save for the rare and special occasions during which all gather to eat collectively.
“Rather than marketing to family occasions and iconic meals of the past, new opportunity spaces exist to market to the vast number of adults who are increasingly eating alone.”
