U.S. plant-based milks - statistics & facts
Plant-based milk alternatives are by far the largest plant-based market segment in the United States. Sales of milk alternatives amounted to 2.9 billion U.S. dollars annually. In comparison, the next largest segment, meat alternatives, generated 1.2 billion U.S. dollars in sales. Not included in this milk category are plant-based creamers. Creamers were the third-largest plant-based segment and generated an additional 701 million. While other plant-based segments, such as meat substitutes, have been struggling with sales in values, milk alternatives are having an easier time on the market but did not escape unscathed. Unit sales for milk substitutes are down by eight percent to a total of 744 million. In comparison, the category’s sales values have barely moved.
While the U.S. plant-based milk market and its brands struggle with growth, adjacent plant-based creamers were one of the few plant-based categories with growing sales. It remains to be seen if the trend of declining unit sales will reverse in the coming year or if consumers continue to shop less plant-based milk.
America’s thirst for almond milk
The favorite plant-based milk of U.S. consumers appears to be almond milk. Sales values of almond milk were more than twice the sales of the next largest category, oat milk. Together, both categories made up close to 2.3 billion U.S. dollars in sales. Around 1.6 billion of those are accounted for by almond milk. U.S. consumers are most likely to pick almond milk from Blue Diamond as just above 40 percent of the almond milk market are accounted for by its products.The landscape of brands
Blue Diamond’s Almond Breeze is one of the most well-known brands on the U.S. market. Among consumers of milk alternatives, 84 percent are aware of the brand and 43 percent like it. In the general population still 76 percent of respondents have heard of Almond Breeze only Silk has a higher brand awareness. Among pure oat milk brands, Planet Oat is the U.S. market leader, with sales of close to 190 million U.S. dollars.While the U.S. plant-based milk market and its brands struggle with growth, adjacent plant-based creamers were one of the few plant-based categories with growing sales. It remains to be seen if the trend of declining unit sales will reverse in the coming year or if consumers continue to shop less plant-based milk.
