Grocery Sales Dip As Restaurant Sales Pick Up

While year-over-year dollar growth in the grocery industry continues to trend above historical growth rates, last month witnessed a decline in basket growth for groceries, while the restaurant industry saw a sales acceleration from July. These trends, though only a small snapshot on a longer trajectory of largely positive performance for the grocery industry, indicate that Americans are starting to spend more of their income allocated for meals in restaurants rather than at grocery stores, at least in comparison to earlier in the summer. 

More densely populated areas, which have kept more stringent restrictions on dining during the coronavirus pandemic, saw depressed restaurant sales compared to less densely populated areas, according to M Science. Online grocery delivery had a flatter deceleration in sales in regions with tighter in-person dining restrictions, such as in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut. In New York City, which had the highest number of restaurants and cafes per capita of any city in the country before the coronavirus pandemic, Governor Andrew Cuomo has said restaurants can resume indoor dining at 25% capacity on Sept. 30.