How GLP-1 Medicine Are Slicing Down Grocery Spending

Ozempic, Mounjaro, and different glucagon-like peptide-1 medicines, in any other case referred to as GLP-1s, are altering how People store for groceries. 

In early January, Meals & Wine printed a narrative about how meals corporations are releasing all-new merchandise or reimagining the advertising of previous ones to enchantment to extra GLP-1 customers who could also be searching for particular diet wants like high-protein, high-fiber meals. In that story, we talked about one tiny however essential analysis paper by Cornell College that confirmed that households with not less than one GLP-1 person are considerably lowering their grocery spending. However what, particularly, are they spending much less on?  

Within the paper, printed on December 27, 2024, the researchers famous that they reached this conclusion after inspecting information from Numerator. Numerator hyperlinks survey responses from 150,000 households on GLP-1 medicine adoption and timing to meals purchases to supply a consultant panel of households in the US. Importantly, its survey additionally took under consideration “off-label customers,” aka these people who find themselves not seen in insurance coverage claims information as their medicines are bought out of pocket, giving a extra “complete understanding of adoption traits.”

After taking a look at transaction information, the crew used a “difference-in-differences” framework to match GLP-1 adopters and non-adopters and located that, on common, adopters decreased their grocery spending by 5.5% within the first six months, whereas higher-income households had a “notably bigger discount, averaging 8.6%.” 

The researchers then took it one step additional by analyzing 40 product classes to see the place GLP-1 customers are spending extra and fewer. They discovered that the biggest reductions had been within the ultra-processed classes, together with “snack meals, sweets, and different calorie-dense objects,” together with different items usually related to “impulse purchases,” like chips and sweets.  

However the reductions in spending did not cease there. In line with the evaluation, GLP-1 customers additionally confirmed a decline in “food-away-from-home expenditures.” The researchers discovered that customers declined their spending at limited-service eating places, together with quick meals chains and occasional outlets, with the “most pronounced” reductions throughout breakfast and dinner occasions. 

Nevertheless, GLP-1 customers did present will increase in spending in some grocery retailer areas. Particularly, the evaluation reveals that “nutrient-dense choices, equivalent to yogurt, recent produce, and diet bars,” had been the “least affected” by the adjustments in buying. As Meals & Wine reported, that is probably why so many manufacturers are going all-in on their protein-rich meals.

Maybe most significantly, the analysis confirmed that this will not be a passing fad. It analyzed buying information 12 months into GLP-1 customers’ journeys and located that whereas the magnitude of reductions plateaus at round six months, it stays “detrimental and statistically important” a full yr later.

“Our findings spotlight the potential for GLP-1 medicines to considerably reshape client meals demand,” the crew wrote, including that it is “a development with more and more essential implications for the meals business as adoption continues to develop.”