“Veganuary” helped boost grocery sales by 3.4 per cent compared to last year according to new data.
The health trend encourages people to abstain from meat and dairy throughout the month of January, switching to vegetable based meals.
According to Kantar, 29 per cent of evening meals no longer contain meat and fish as sales of spinach nearly doubled in the past 12 months.
Fraser McKevitt, head of retail and consumer insight at Kantar Worldpanel, said:“As consumers look to more healthy alternatives following the holiday, trends like Veganuary have taken off and now 29% of evening meals contain no meat or fish at all.
“This sustained interest in vegan and vegetarian diets is reflected in the chilled aisles – over January one in ten shoppers bought a meat-free ready meal, causing sales to rocket by 15% compared to this time last year.
He added: “Sales of spinach, cherries and aubergine also grew strongly compared to the past 12 months – up 43%, 25% and 23% respectively.”
Despite changing consumption trends Tesco remains the fastest growing of the big four supermarkets, with sales up 2.6 per cent over the past 12 weeks.
Lidl, however, remained the largest grower overall with its sales jumping 16.3 per cent from this time last year, according to Kantar.
All of the big four retailers lost market share to discounters, with Aldi nearly matching its rival with growth of 16.2 per cent since last year.
Asda and Morrisons both expanded by 2.2 per cent, while Sainsbury’s increased sales by 1.5 per cent. Overall grocery inflation stands at 3.6 per cent.
