Chicken meat sales showed “impressive volume growth” during the 12 weeks ending July 17, but only managed “limited” price progress during the same period, according to the latest meat, fish and poultry (MFP) figures released by market analysts, Kantar Worldpanel.
Commenting mainly on a disappointing time for traditional BBQ meats, especially burgers and sausages, Kantar’s MFP business unit director, Nathan Ward, said that chicken’s impressive volume growth was offset during the period by falling prices.
“Chicken breasts are seeing falling base prices,” said Mr Ward (pictured above), adding that legs, meanwhile, have seen a promotion-led volume increase of 20% year-on-year, an advance stimulated by over half a million more shoppers buying legs this summer than in 2015.
On the BBQ front in general, however, Kantar’s figures showed that the long awaited summer heatwave, which finally hit most parts of the UK in July, did little to drive additional sales of burgers and sausages,
Having waited for the hotter weather to arrive, people appear to have moved their BBQ demand to primary meat and poultry items, helping to explain the poultry sector’s strong volume growth over the 12-week period.
Beef and chilled fish also made volume progress during the review period, driven by 400,000 more shoppers buying beef during the 12 weeks than in the equivalent period last year while chilled fish products attracted 730,000 more shoppers, year-on-year.
