Similar to many beverage categories today, dairy and dairy alternative beverages have experienced the impact of clean-label and health-and-wellness trends. As these trends proliferate, experts note that the overall dairy market has experienced slight declines; however, several segments within it are driving growth.
“The milk category as a whole declined 2.6 percent in the 52 weeks ending August 26, 2017,” says Jordan Rost, vice president of consumer insights at New York-based Nielsen. “However, in looking across varieties, we see that specialty milks (including lactose-free varieties) and milk substitutes are the only sub-categories driving growth, with dollar sales up 11.9 percent and 2.7 percent, respectively. Dollar sales of regular white milk declined 4.8 percent, and even for its better-for-you counterpart, organic white milk, dollar sales were also down 2.9 percent.”