Abstract

۱٫ Introduction

۲٫ Data

۳٫ Results

۴٫ Conclusions

Acknowledgments

Disclosure statement

Funding

References

Abstract

     While a large number of studies have investigated seafood consumption in various markets, surprisingly little is known about the types of seafood sold in retail outlets or their product forms in the USA. This is particularly true for fresh seafood, which is generally regarded as the most valuable product form of seafood. In this article, a unique dataset on retail in-store seafood sales that includes information about three main product forms (fresh, frozen, and shelf-stable products) was analyzed. Fresh seafood is important, as it makes up 43% of sales revenue. Moreover, some species are almost exclusively sold fresh, with trout and lobster as prime examples. Fresh also includes the greatest diversity of species and, as such, is the most likely product form for new producers to succeed. National sales are dominated by a few species, with salmon and shrimp accounting for a large portion of the fresh (27%) and frozen categories (43%), respectively, and tuna dominating the shelf-stable category (75%). There are also a large number of species with mostly small market shares. There are few differences in regional sales patterns for the main species, with notable exceptions such as whitefish in New England and crawfish in Louisiana and Texas. The degree of urbanization and income level appears as the important drivers for seafood sales.

Introduction

     Seafood consumption in the USA has gradually increased for decades and includes a mixture of wild-caught and aquacultured species, from both domestic and imported sources (Shamshak et  al. 2019; Love et  al. 2020). As US fish stocks are generally well-managed at or near maximum sustainable yield and aquaculture production in the USA is limited, most of the increase in consumption originates from imports (Gephart et  al. 2019; Shamshak et  al. 2019). Readily available data on domestic landings, some aquaculture production, and trade enable estimates of availability (Shamshak et  al. 2019; Kroetz et  al. 2020); however, information on where seafood is consumed –in terms of both food sourcing and sub-national data, and in which product categories – is highly limited, particularly at the species level. Love et  al. (2020) recently found that about two-thirds of expenditures on seafood occurs away from home, primarily at restaurants, while seafood purchased for at home consumption makes up a much larger share by weight (56% at home vs 31% at restaurants and 13% at other outlets) (Love et  al. 2020). Moreover, these shares vary significantly by species and region. For instance, 52% of shrimp consumption occurs at home compared with 70% of salmon and 77% of tilapia consumption (Love et  al. 2020), and per capita consumption in Atlantic coastal regions is twice than that of the Midwest (Love et  al. 2020). The origin and product forms of purchased seafood are important to understand the growth in opportunities for the seafood industry – in particular in the specific market segments where domestic landings compete with typically lower priced imports – and how different parts of the seafood market respond to shocks or other sources of instability and natural variation.

Conclusions

     The US retail sector has a wide diversity of seafood species, product categories, brands, and regional sales, which makes it both complex and interesting to study. Purchases are highly focused on a handful of commodity products sold through mainstream supply chains with national distribution. Despite the diversity in seafood, which is a function of natural diversity in aquatic life (Metian et  al. 2020), the retail sector is fairly homogeneous and does not reflect the full diversity of species caught and farmed in US waters. Sales for fresh seafood vary by region, as well as by household income and urban population percentage. This suggests that better logistics and infrastructure in urban areas support fresh seafood distribution, and higher incomes allow consumers to purchase fresh products that are often at higher price points than frozen products. The opposite was true for frozen seafood, which was associated with lower household income and lower share of urban population. Shelf-stable seafood had no association with region, income, or urbanization. The Nielsen dataset does not provide insights into other food sources such as food service or self-caught seafood; however, other studies have done so (Love et  al. 2020).