One in four French households purchase foie gras at Christmas, making it a flagship product for the festive season, new data from Kantar has revealed.
According to Kantar, among the top purchases for French consumers during the holiday season are foie gras, pâtés, sausage, appetisers, rillettes, olives and shellfish, with eight times more aperitifs consumed over Christmas than during the rest of the year.
Household Consumption
Consumption of foie gras at Christmas time averages 0.4 kilograms per household, the data indicated, even though foie gras is only purchased on average 1.5 times per year.
Elsewhere, frozen appetisers now feature in 17.5% of households, while blinis are consumed by 11.9%.
Seafood also dominates holiday purchasing in France, with over half of households (51.4%) purchasing smoked fish, and a third (32%) purchasing fresh shellfish. Seafood spreads and delicacies like fish roe and caviar are enjoyed by 19.8% and 12.2% of households, respectively, while frozen shellfish is purchased by 11.9% of households.
Sweet Temptations
When it comes to dessert, pastries are consumed by 26.9% of households, followed by frozen desserts (21.5%) and dessert biscuits (12%).
While it is a year-round staple of the French shopping basket, bread is another essential element of the festive dinner table; sandwich bread is purchased by 66.1% of households, while gingerbread appeals to 13.2%.
'One constant emerges: the French are looking for pleasure all the more when they consume in a festive context,' Kantar noted.
According to the most recent market share data from Kantar, Carrefour was the best-performing grocer in October, reporting a 2.4-percentage-point gain, to hold 21.4% of the market in the period from 7 October to 3 November.
Carrefour gained 759,000 new customers in the period, partly driven by its takeover of the Cora business.
