A Boom In Air Fryers Boosts Sales For Nestle, Tyson, And Other Food Giants

Known for its kettle-cooked potato chips, Kettle Foods recently introduced what it called the "future of the potato chip category": air-fried potato chips.

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Campbell Soup's latest snack launch, which leverages patent-pending technology, is the latest example of Big Food betting that consumers' affinity for all things cooked in air fryers will translate into increased sales.

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U.S. consumers are expected to spend nearly $1 billion on air fryers by 2022, an increase of 51% from 2019, according to market research firm The NPD Group. It has been reported that sales of cooking appliance have soared since 2017, and they were given an extra boost during the early days of the pandemic as people began cooking more at home as a result of the virus.

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Since more workers are returning to the office and spending less time in the kitchen, consumers are increasingly turning to portable convection ovens as they save time in the kitchen. The main draw is the ease and speed of using the appliance, as well as the ability to achieve a crispy texture without the need to deep-fry food, according to Joe Derochowski, the home industry advisor at the NPD Group. Food manufacturers want to take advantage of this trend in order to capitalize on it.

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“There is a saying that says necessity is the mother of invention. Having said that, in this particular case, the necessity is to be able to continue to grow the top line," stated Ken Harris, managing partner at Cadent Consulting Group. “A good way to grow a company's top line is to take existing behaviors and find a new way to make use of them. This is the most efficient method of growing a business.”

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During the early days of the pandemic, big food companies like Kraft Heinz and Nestle saw a surge in sales. Despite consumers eating out again at restaurants and cooking less as a result of double-digit price hikes, food manufacturers' sales still kept growing even as consumers started eating out again at restaurants and cooking less. It is estimated that the volume of groceries purchased by shoppers will shrink in 2022 due to consumers opting for cheaper alternatives instead of the more expensive ones.

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As it has been necessary for food companies to look for other sources of growth as inflation cools and retailers put pressure on suppliers to decrease prices.

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In order to increase the value that Nestle U.S. can provide for its customers, Adam Graves, president of Nestle U.S.'s pizza and snacking division, said that the company plans to capitalize on the air fryer boom by promoting its frozen food brands.

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“Air fryers are the hottest trend in cooking right now, and we are seeing it more and more in modern times,” said Graves, who owns two of the air fryers himself.

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In the past year, Nestle has introduced pizza bites under its DiGiorno and Stouffer brands as a new product. There is a message on both packaging lines that says, "Try It in Your Air Fryer." Other Nestle products, such as Hot Pockets, now include instructions for cooking them in the air fryer along with instructions for heating them in the microwave or oven as well.

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With the launch of its air-fried product line in 2019, Tyson Foods was one of the first brands to jump on the trend. From its chicken strips to its newest product, parmesan-seasoned chicken bites, the products contain 75% less fat than their previous products. The Tyson brand has reached roughly $100 million in retail sales every year, according to Colleen Hall, senior marketing director for the brand.

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The company has also reached a third of the way through the process of adding instructions for using air fryers to the packaging of its frozen prepared foods.

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In Hall's opinion, if you take a look at how often it is used as a preparation method, then the number is around 5%. “I think that consumers want to use it more, that they want to have a wider range of options when it comes to using it. We are putting it on our packaging at a good time for us, so it makes sense for us to include it."

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Tyson's brand favorability is increasing as a result of the air fryer directions, according to Hall who cited recent brand health data as evidence. According to her, she chalked it up to the convenience of the appliance and the perceived health benefits that come from cooking.

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Gorton's Seafood is getting more into air frying to retain the customers it gained during pandemic lockdowns.

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'[The pandemic] was a pretty dramatic shift that brought a lot of new households into our category and into our brand,' said Jake Holbrook, Gorton's vice president of marketing to Trade Algo. “It has been a priority for us to keep consumers engaged through our messaging and our products in order to keep Americans eating more seafood in the future."

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Bandwagons are filling up

It seems that air frying is the second most popular method of reheating frozen prepared foods, according to Holbrook.

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By putting air fryer cooking instructions on its website, the company, which is owned by Nissui, has taken advantage of the trend. After that, the directions were added to the packaging. Air Fried Butterfly Shrimp and Air Fried Fish Fillets were introduced by the company in January of this year.

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Consumers can reheat Gorton's butterfly shrimp and fish fillets by air frying them again after air frying before packaging. On the packaging of the product, it is advertised that there is a 50% reduction in fat content.

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“As long as it’s trendy in the next two years, everyone is going to jump on the bandwagon,” Harris stated.

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Other food makers are also following the trend, with Kellogg, for example, adding instructions on how to use an air fryer to its plant-based Morningstar Farms products in early 2021 in response to customer inquiries regarding the use of air fryers. In the same way, Hormel Foods has been responding to consumers' desire for air fryers by updating their packaging, adding recipes on their website, and creating cooking videos that show how to prepare Spam fries and corned beef hash using their air fryers.

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The company has even gone one step further by focusing on consumers who have never bought an air fryer before. With the help of Insta Brands, the company that makes the Insta-Pot and its own version of the air fryer, the company gave away a version of the air fryer in December as part of its promotion. Nestle U.S. also ran a similar giveaway internally for its employees as part of a loyalty program.

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It is estimated that roughly 60% of U.S. households currently own an air fryer, based on Graves' statistics. Technology hasn't become ubiquitous yet, but it is on its way.

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“The air fryer’s got a long way to go if you compare it to a microwave oven - there is a microwave in nearly every home - because the air fryer has a long way to go,” said Harris.

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It is still a long way from joining the microwave as a household staple in the kitchen of the average American household. According to the NPD Group, the air fryer is expected to surpass grills and multicookers as the fourth most popular cooking appliance in 2022, overtaking grills and multicookers.

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“People initially thought [the air fryer] was something that was a fad and something that might only be a fad for a while,” said Tyson’s Hall. Similarly to the 1970s, people thought the same thing about microwaves when they first came out.