Consumer Eating and Dining Habits of America Today (3/6)

According to the Census Bureau, 88 percent of the nation's population growth between 2000 and 2030 will occur in the South and West. The share of the nation's population living in those regions will increase from 58 percent in 2000 to 65 percent by 2030, while the combined share of the Northeast and Midwest will decline from 42 percent to 35 percent in that time. Generations in transition The major population players are baby boomers, a generation of roughly 76 million people born between 1946 and 1964; the so-called Generation X crowd, or the approximately 50 million individuals born between 1965 and 1979; and the successor to that group, Generation Y. Generation Age Group Population Baby Boomers, Age 59 & over 76 million Generation X, Age 40 & over 50 million Generation Y, Age 10 - 24 70 million "Baby boomers are moving into the empty-nester stage; they use restaurants differently than they did when they had kids [at home]. Generation X, more and more, has young children; and now you have Generation Y getting married and having children Generation Y, also known as the "Echo Boom" generation, is a club of about 70 million people between the ages of 10 and 24. Empty-nesters and Gen-Xers and Gen-Yers with kids don't go out as much, or if they do, they go out more often to fast-food restaurants. In addition to being time starved, the new Gen X and Gen Y parents don't have as much discretionary money as they did in the past, researchers say. Among those age-based purchasing patterns, males ages 18 to 26 are the heaviest users of fast-food outlets; empty-nesters, with their kids now living on their own, have more discretionary income and therefore tend to spend more in restaurants. Lifestyle Changes – The Stayed-at-home-mom Phenomenon According to Harry Balzer, vice president of NPD Group, a consumer research firm based in Port Washington, N.Y., "The engine for restaurant industry growth for the last 50 years has been the increase in the number of women working in the latest year over the previous year." However, NPD data now observes in “the stay-at-home mom phenomenon”, which is happening in the past four years. Industry observers believe, the change is more of a reflection of the economic situation of the nation, rather than a reflection of a cultural change. Balzer says, "In the last three or four years, the percentage of women working has been sitting at about 60 percent, and it is not going up," he adds. The apparent stabilization of the female workforce "puts pressure on the restaurant industry for true, organic growth." With moms staying at home, families tend to visit quick-service /fast food places more often and use take-out services more often than they would eat at full-service restaurants. Restaurants are doing things to increase convenience or better meet consumer-lifestyle needs. Such as providing salads and fruits at fast-food restaurants, larger portions at fast-food restaurants… By the NDP data, 21 percent of all meals Americans eat are from restaurants; and there is no doubt that Americans want to make fewer meals for themselves. The only question is: “How much is a restaurant going to charge me to make my meals?" Children Play A Role in Choice of Where to Eat Restaurateurs have known for many years that "kids count" . Children, in fact, often can be the principal decision-makers when it comes to choosing where the family will dine out. "If the kids prefer Applebee's over Chili's and the parents are neutral, the family will go to Applebee's Consequently, kids' meals and children's menus have emerged as an important foodservice marketing tool as operators find themselves having to vie for the vote of Generation X's offspring as well as that of their parents. By the same token, kids can provide a powerful veto vote. If the kids stopped coming to your restaurant, they lead their parents elsewhere. More Diverse Americans