U.S. grocery slowdown deepens as shoppers buy fewer items, raising pressure on food companies
The U.S. grocery slowdown is becoming harder to ignore.
Shoppers are buying fewer items than a year ago, and grocery sales are declining as weakening unit sales are now outweighing rising prices. That is according to new analysis from Bain & Company using NielsenIQ grocery data shared exclusively with CNBC.
Grocery units, which refer to individual items or products sold, fell 1.8% in June from a year earlier, a sharp reversal from the 0.1% year-over-year growth recorded in June 2025. While prices continue to rise about 2% to 3% year-over-year, that inflation cushion for the industry is no longer enough to keep overall sales growing.
33 replies
Have they tried paying people more?
That dude in the picture definitely has his pants stuffed full of stolen shit, right?
All I know is, I'm 43, when I was a kid in the 90s we'd go grocery shopping and have an overflowing cart that was around $100. Now, the same cart $100 isn't enough to cover the wire mesh at the bottom of the cart. It's absolutely insane. I bet it would be $400 to fill the cart. That's not inflation thats a scam.
I genuinely don't know how families are doing it. I spend as much on food as a single person as my parents did with a family in the early 2000s. Granted, we didn't eat much, but we didn't starve, and I don't eat much either. I rarely eat meat, I don't go to restaurants, and maybe once every month or two I'll "treat" myself to a gas station meal or a bagel sandwich from a coffee shop. I'm so glad I don't have children to try to feed.
It is absolutely a scam. Remember the egg shortage? Eggs were going for $7+ a dozen in SoCal and a few miles across the border the prices had only risen slightly to maybe $2.50/dozen.
And now there's this:
Forcing U.S. egg producers to pay a minuscule 0.37% fine on $1.22 billion in excess profits sends an unmistakable message to businesses everywhere. With Trump in charge they can fleece Americans without the slightest fear of consequences and they are doing just that.
Won't someone think of the shareholders???
I'd buy a lot more food if my job paid me more. Instead, rice and beans baby. Maybe a splurge on champagne every time a key republican dies, but that's it.
Rice and beans are pretty good though, especially if you add in a little salsa or some grape tomatoes and a sprinkle of shredded cheese.
Oh yeah. I throw anything in there. I sincerely enjoy it, in addition to it being cheap. But I used to buy a lot of other stuff too.
Starting to think if prices go up ozempic starts to become cost effective
If prices keep going up you probably won't need ozempic.
this should be the true economic indicator, not the fucking DOW. idc if the DOW is fifty million, if people cant afford food we have a major fucking problem.
DJIA is not an economic indicator. The index highlights half of the relation between Industrials and Transports (DJTA). The S&P 500 is closer to an economic indicator but still not really. The Dow is usually referenced as a distraction from real indicators like the Capitalization to GDP ratio (aka Buffett Indicator). If one looks at the real indicators, we've been in some real economy ending doom for quite a while now.
But Pam Bondi said that all that matters is that the Dow is at 50k, not these Epstein files!
Food is famously a luxury good so it makes sense people would pull back in order to spend their money on necessities like bombs to drop on foreign elementary schools and shit
I'm trying to limit my avocado toasts to just 3 times a week.
Whoa, moneybags over here just casually mentioning they eat a whole avocado and also get three square pieces of bread every week.
Don't forget to save for some children's hospital bombs too
I like the headline:
"It's a problem for the food companies that the customer don't have money"
That's OK, they'll just raise prices more to make up for the falling consumption! /s
Remember, the only two nations to vote against food -- FOOD being a human right at the UN a few years ago were... the USA and Israel.
Thanks a lot GLP1!
The cost of each dose probably overshoots that of food unless your insurance is really good.
Well if you want to do a net cost analysis you also need to consider the healthcare costs of spiraling obesity.
You maximize profit by raising prices until the units sold fall to the point where prices * units falls below the peak. The peak is where profit is maximized. It seems they've reached it. For the next little while they'll keep on cutting costs to grow profits. Recipe reformulations with fewer and cheaper ingredients, cheaper substitutions, more soy and water in the sausages, and other general quality reductions.
Companies should have thought of the repercussions before shoveling cash into fascism.
When your entire focus is one fiscal quarter long, you never think of the long term repercussions of your choices.
It's becoming harder to ignore the prices are higher and quality is worse than ever
Hey, don't forget about quantity! Cereal boxes are so thin that they can't stand up on their own anymore, old recipes don't work anymore because cans are too small, and pretty much every non-food item has gotten 25% smaller or more.
Would someone please think of the companies!?
Probably doesn't help that some of the food can give you weeks long explosive diarrhea.
In Canada we are spending like 120% of our income on groceries and it isnt just the inflation but the compounding shrinkflation with climate crisis causing inclement weather that means crop insecurity...
It aint looking good and at this point companies are going to have to realize they cant profit if nobody has any money to spend
These grocery stores have been locking up a lot of items as well further shooting themselves in the foot because they refuse to look long term.