Make room in the shopping cart for the mighty potato.
Recent data collected by Potatoes USA shows potatoes have the highest household penetration of any vegetable.
Potatoes are purchased by consumers an average of 10 times each year, Kayla Vogel, senior global marketing manager for Potatoes USA, said in a news release.
“Potatoes can be the accelerator to total produce and total store success,” she said.
Potatoes accounted for a whopping 21% of all fresh vegetable pounds sold in 2022 and are one of the few produce items outpacing the 2019 pre-pandemic baseline in pounds, Vogel said.
According to recent Circana data based on U.S. year-over-year sales ending July 31, fresh potatoes:
- Generated 5.3% of all fresh produce sales and are the fourth-highest selling produce item.
- Earned 10.8% of all vegetable sales and are a substantial No. 2 behind tomatoes as the top-selling vegetable.
- Fresh potato dollar sales increased 16.4% year on year — the highest produce growth rate — reaching $4.1 billion.
- Dollar sales are up 23.2% over two years.
- Fresh potatoes have been the top produce item in delivering new dollars over the past year, at an additional $572 million.
- Fresh potatoes added more new dollars over the past year than all fruits combined.
“Fresh potatoes have an above-average share of dollars sold on promotions, at 35.6%, up 13.1% versus year-ago levels,” Vogel said. “This is above the total produce department and vegetable aisle.”
Vogel said that potatoes are a retailer’s “dream,” with high household penetration (85%), a high number of annual trips (10), and a nice dollar ring each trip ($4.04, up 14.8% year over year).
“As budgets tighten, people have remained loyal to potatoes,” Vogel said. “That means a lot of opportunity to significantly move the needle through improved visibility, merchandising and cross-merchandising.”
If retailers can prompt half of their current potato buyers to make one additional potato purchase a year, the result would be an additional $220 million in sales, she said.
