Cargill’s consumer TrendTracker reveals ‘battle between reward and guilt’

Keith Albright has a reputation for being a healthy eater. He packs cauliflower for lunch.

“I mean, I do eat healthy, but it’s so I can sin later,” he said. “That’s how I balance the permission to indulge.”

Albright, the marketing insights and analytics manager at Cargill, embodies what he sees many Americans attempting to do — making enough healthy choices so they can earn indulgences.

Cargill’s latest TrendTracker report validates what he has seen. While consumers demand healthy, sustainable food, they also have an anxious desire for decadent experiences and food that meets emotional needs.

And that relationship is evolving, surveys showed.

“These trends rely on each other,” he said. “It’s a very purposeful calculation they’re making.”

There’s typically no “Whatever, I’m going to indulge” sense of resignation about these tradeoffs, Albright said. Choosing a treat now goes well beyond the numbers on the label.

“A few years ago it was about calories, grams of fat, sugar, but now consumers are doing the math at a much higher and holistic level,” he said. “We’re calculating that emotional payoff almost as much as the ingredients.”

That emotional benefit — satisfaction, excitement or comfort — usually comes with a price: guilt. Albright’s healthy lunch doesn’t completely offset the guilt he experiences by indulging later in the day, but it does help minimize it, he said.

It’s a “battle between reward and guilt,” as one survey respondent put it.

Sometimes it’s a quest for balance — like doing yoga at a brewery.

Consumer surveys often produce contradictory findings when it comes to the push and pull between wellness and indulgence. Most shoppers have tried to spend less over the past year in the face of rapid inflation, Cargill found, but half are still looking to bring home “premium” treats, like a small and spendy pint of ice cream.

Another example: About 75% of Americans say they’re trying to reduce their sugar intake, according to a survey from the International Food Information Council (IFIC). But shoppers consistently rank taste as the top reason they’ll buy any kind of food.

Fruity Cheerios, with six times the sugar as the regular variety of the country’s bestselling cereal, has been an instant success for General Mills.

“Fruity Cheerios is already the number one new product in the cereal category since we launched it,” General Mills CEO Jeff Harmening said last week. “It tastes great.”

The main drivers for food decisions have remained the same for more than a decade, according to the IFIC survey. In order, they are taste, price, healthfulness and convenience, with environmental sustainability a much lower priority for most. Healthfulness only becomes more important than price when respondents have high incomes — and when it does, taste becomes even more important.

Research shows consumers apply these values to shopping cart decisions in a matter of seconds as they move through the store.

Ideally, food can balance taste with health to make those decisions easier. Minnetonka-based Cargill is constantly researching ways to take the guilt out of guilty pleasures and recently developed a plant-based ice cream bar with big flavor, low fat and 70 calories.

“Health remains a key focus area,” said John Satumba, Cargill’s indulgence R&D lead. “But I ultimately also want to make sure that I’m just having a good time when I’m eating my chocolate, my ice cream.”

Regina Draper, a Cargill food scientist and manager of dairy and dairy alternative R&D, agreed that “taste is king.”

“But we’re also looking at improving the nutritional profile so that we can be intentional,” she said. “You want ice cream, but you also want to adhere to whatever diet you’ve created for yourself.”

The struggle is hitting all those preferences at the right price.

Natural and organic food sales grew faster than overall food last year, especially in snacks, according to Spins, a Chicago-based data firm. But in many cases that’s because “better-for-you” brands are more expensive.

Food focused on capturing the demand for health and wellness is expected to keep winning in the years ahead, industry reports say. And so are Oreos, which last year reached $4 billion in annual sales for the first time, doubling in a decade.

Even with the best intentions, cost still outranks health for most shoppers. An IFIC survey shows if a trail mix had an FDA-approved “healthy” label, barely half would consider paying even 50 cents more for it if there was a cheaper and comparable product.

Value, Albright said, has to check a lot of boxes to move beyond price. A majority of consumers say they’re actively avoiding salt, sugar and saturated fat, but roughly the same number say they’ll indulge just to satisfy a craving.

“Value is more than price, it comes into play in terms of what I’m getting out of that product and that experience,” he said. “Consumers use indulgences to compensate for the value they look for elsewhere.”