Report: Consumers Ask for Protein & Fiber, Lower Prices

TikTok Shop is growing faster than companies in its leading categories like Shein and Sephora. Consumers continue to believe they aren’t getting enough protein or fiber and are looking for products that speak to that demand. All the while Americans believe food prices are rising and the country is in a recession (though, by all economic measures, it is not) yet life satisfaction scores and holiday shopping have reached record highs.

That’s all at least according to The New Consumer and Coefficient Capital’s fifth annual Consumer Trends report.

High Protein, High Fiber and Hot Honey: While Google searches for “foods with protein” and “foods with fiber” fell relatively in line with one another (with demand steadily increasing), searches for Hot Honey skyrocketed. On TikTok, interest in Pickle Cotton Candy rose 1,209% year-over-year, only to be followed by tajadas (a.k.a. deep fried plantain slices) at 508% interest growth, determined by views on the platform. Overall, we aren’t sure what these results say about the American palette…

While hot honey, pickle cotton candy and fried plantains take hold, the almighty Bagel has asserted a cult-like grip on society this year, becoming one of the few things people will wait in line for. Take brands like Pop Up Bagels, which has raised $8 million to grow its limited-drop-based business, as one example. But shop owners around the country are facing pushback from neighbors and landlords over long lines – including most recently New York’s Apollo Bagels and Washington, D.C.’s Call Your Mother. That all seems to spell whitespace for anyone who can crack the code on a good bagel, made at-home.

In terms of nutrition, people are turning on supplements and powders and eying whole foods to up their protein and fiber intakes. Sixty-eight percent of consumers want more high protein whole foods while only 28% prefer to get their intake from protein smoothies. Those results largely mirror fiber findings, where 53% of consumers said they’d prefer to obtain the nutrient from whole foods and 35% eyeing fiber-filled snacks, meals and drinks.

TikTok Shop: As heard during Nosh Live last week (directly from the platform’s head of food and beverage, we might add) TikTok Shop is a quintessential discovery platform, not a replacement for retailers like Amazon and Walmart. About 21% of TikTok users have purchased a food or beverage via the Shop integration, but volumes are primarily going to categories like fashion, beauty, electronics and home goods.

• But that’s not to say it is impossible. Of the nearly half of TikTok users that have shopped the Shop, they report a 91% satisfaction rate with the service and 90% have made additional purchases on the platform.
• That’s not all: About 74% have repurchased a product they’ve discovered on TikTok Shop through the platform while 50% will move that purchase to Amazon and 30% over to Temu.
• Broadly however, these shoppers’ ecommerce dollars are still largely being spent on Amazon, Target and Walmart.

Pricing Problems: And last on the report’s hit list – consumers complaints about the economy and how closely tied it is to their shopping carts. While life satisfaction scores in the U.S. have steadily increased since 2022 (up from a score of 5.8 to 6.9 out of 10), 60% of Americans believe the country is in a recession.

That is likely tied to the fact that food prices remained 20% higher than they were just five years ago – “a 30-year rarity,” the report highlights. Although inflation is down and has remained around 2.5%, nearly half of Americans (46%) claim that food prices are still increasing (though that figure has decreased from 64% of Americans in last year’s report).