Specialty Food Stores Industry Profile

Companies in this industry sell products such as meat, fish, fruits and vegetables, baked goods, candy, and gourmet foods from physical retail locations, often specializing in a single product category. No major companies dominate the industry.

Sales of specialty foods have been increasing worldwide as demand for ethnic foods has continued to grow. In part, the increase comes from immigrant consumers seeking out foods from their own cultures. In the US, it is expected that the buying power of the Latinx population will reach $1.9 trillion, which is higher than the gross domestic product of countries like Australia, Spain and Mexico, according to Nielsen.

The US specialty food store industry includes about 22,000 establishments (single-location companies and units of multi-location companies) with combined annual revenue of about $20 billion. Retail specialty food sales grew nearly 10% from 2016 to 2018 (compared with 3% for all food sales), driven by product innovations and wider availability of specialty foods through mass-market outlets, according to the 2019-2020 State of the Specialty Food Industry report from the Specialty Food Association, Mintel and SPINS/IRI, which tracks US sales of specialty foods through supermarkets, natural food stores, and specialty food retailers. By channel, retail food stores account for about 75% of all specialty food sales in the US. While online represents less than 3% of specialty food sales, it is the fastest growing sales channel, up 41% since 2016.

The industry includes meat markets, seafood markets, ...