Another major US dairy, Borden, seeks bankruptcy protection. (Winona Daily News, 1/7/2020)
American refrigerators are increasingly stocked with juice, soda and milk substitutes made from soy or almonds. At the same time, protein bars, yogurts and other on-the-go breakfasts have replaced a morning bowl of cereal. That has hammered traditional milk producers like Borden, which was founded in 1857.
The amount of liquid milk consumed per capita in the U.S. has tumbled more than 40% since 1975. Americans drank around 24 gallons a year in 1996, according to government data. That dropped to 17 gallons in 2018.
11/22/2019 update, "Chobani wants you to eat more yogurt", starts here.
Photo by Retiring Guy
Chobani, Others Scramble to Stop Sliding U.S. Yogurt Sales. (Dairy Herd Management, 11/18/2019)
Despite shelves full of new varieties — from Icelandic to Australian to coconut-based — U.S. yogurt sales are in a multiyear slump. Yogurt companies are confident that more new products can boost sales. But some analysts are skeptical, saying larger trends — like growing sales of protein bars — will be hard to turn around.
“Consumers are just not eating as much yogurt as they once did,” said Caleb Bryant, associate director of food and drink reports for Mintel, a market research company.
1/31/2018 update, "On the other hand, Americans are eating more yogurt, although consumption peaked a few years ago", starts here.
Source: U.S. Department of Agriculture
Related reading:
“In Soviet Georgia” - The Story Behind The Cult Yogurt Ad. (Georgian Journal, 4/18/2015)
Original 1/30/2018 post, "Americans are drinking less cow's milk", starts here.
A Century-Old Dairy Ditches Cows For High-Tech Plant Milk. (NPR, 1/20/2018)
But by 2016, with American milk consumption on a major decline — dropping by more than a third since the 1970s — Schwartz decided it was time to not only get out of dairy, but to move in a whole new direction: plants.
The company is now known as Elmhurst Milked; cows have been replaced by nuts, oats and rice, which are being "milked" by a proprietary cold-water mechanical process invented by food scientist Cheryl Mitchell.
Total consumption (US population X per capita consumption):
- 1976: 6,452,800,000 gallons
- 2016: 5,945,040,000 gallons (a nearly 8% drop)
Related reading:
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