U.K. consumers are now spending more than GBP 6.3 billion (USD 7.9 billion, EUR 7.3 billion) annually on seafood, with more products coming from domestic production. Yet a new report compiled by the U.K. Seafish Authority confirms that consumption is only trending upward in one channel – foodservice.
According to Seafish’s figures, retail sales of seafood for in-home consumption totaled GBP 3.1 billion (USD 3.9 billion, EUR 3.6 billion) last year, which represented a drop of 0.6 percent. In volume terms, these sales equated to 331,151 metric tons (MT) of product or 1.2 million unit sales, down 0.9 percent and 1.3 percent, respectively. Partly offsetting these declines, the average price of seafood sold through retail increased 0.3 percent to GBP 9.40 (USD 11.72, EUR 10.95) per kg.
Meanwhile, over the course of the last two years, there has been a strong resurgence in the amount of eating out-of -home (OOH) by U.K. consumers, and fish has benefited from this foodservice upturn. Restaurant spending and the number of seafood meals served at restaurants shot up 1 percent and 3.8 percent, respectively. In total, the population spent more than GBP 3.2 billion (USD 4 billion, EUR 3.7 billion) on eating seafood away from their homes, while the number of OOH servings neared close to the 1 billion mark. Crucially, the average cost per serving in foodservice fell 2.7 percent to GBP 3.25 (USD 4.05, EUR 3.78) last year, compared with retail which increased by 0.7 percent to GBP 2.60 (USD 3.24, EUR 3.03) per serving.
Seafood’s growth in foodservice has largely been driven by the quick-service restaurant (QSR) sector (excluding fish and chip shops), which increased its sales traffic by 10.8 percent year-on-year and now accounts for 29 percent of total foodservice servings. Also showing strong growth, the workplace/higher education sector increased its traffic by 10.2 percent, taking its market share up to 10.3 percent.
Seafish’s data did, though, reveal modest declines in the amount of servings in both fish and chip outlets and full service restaurants.
In terms of the products sold in foodservice, fried fish dominates the channel with servings up 6.6 percent last year, taking its market share up to almost 37 percent. Some of the biggest growth, however, continues to be seen with fish and seafood sandwiches, which combined now have a 35 percent market share. The only notable decline was in non-fried fish servings, which decreased by 12.5 percent.
In retail, only chilled seafood showed any value growth last year, with sales up 1.1 percent to just under GBP 2 billion (USD 2.5 billion, EUR 2.3 billion). Sales in the frozen and the ambient sectors dropped 1 percent and 7.1 percent respectively to GBP 689.7 million (USD 860.1 million, EUR 802.6 million) and GBP 454.8 million (USD 567.2 million, EUR 529.3 million).
With regard to the products sold in the retail channel, the top three selling species were salmon, tuna and cod, which have respective market shares of 17.1 percent, 16.5 percent and 13.6 percent. The biggest sales growth was shown by warmwater shrimp (up 6.9 percent), salmon (up 5.1 percent) and cod (up 3.6 percent).
To fulfill the market demand, retail and foodservice operators sourced a combined GBP 4.5 billion (USD 5.6 billion, EUR 5.2 billion) worth of seafood products last year, up 1 percent compared with 2014. Of this, the amount acquired from domestic producers increased 6.7 percent to GBP 1.8 billion (USD 2.2 billion, EUR 2.1 billion), while imports dropped 2.4 percent to GBP 2.7 billion (USD 3.4 billion, EUR 3.1 billion). With regard to the domestic supply, GBP 1.2 billion (USD 1.5 billion, EUR 1.4 billion) worth of products came from aquaculture, up 16.4 percent, and GBP 552.4 million (USD 689.2 million, EUR 642.9 million) worth was seafood landed in the country by U.K. vessels, down 10.2 percent.
In line with this greater self-sufficiency, the country’s seafood exports declined by 14.6 percent to GBP 1.3 billion (USD 1.6 billion, EUR 1.5 billion) last year. In volume terms, its main exports were salmon – down 8.9 percent to 117,217 MT, mackerel – down 33.3 percent to 80,251 MT, and herring – up 2.2 percent to 64,844 MT.
