There seems to be a race to pure foods among the nation’s largest supermarkets as they ramp up their offerings, even launch their own brands of organics and naturals, and then heavily advertise the healthy choice.
It all makes sense, considering sales of this segment of groceries are outpacing traditional grocery sales.
Nationwide, natural and organic food sales grew 8 percent in 2010 versus the less than 1 percent growth in the $630 billion total U.S. food market, according to the Nutrition Business Journal. It grew at about a 5 percent rate each year from 2005 to 2009.
With that growth and popularity comes a definite consumer advantage: Slowly but surely, the price of natural foods is falling.
“Our whole food culture is moving in a direction of less preservatives, less processed and just the whole ingredient count is so much more on people’s minds.”