Nearly All U.S. Consumers Will Celebrate Thanksgiving, Survey Reveals
Consumer data released by Numerator finds that grocery stores remain the retail channel of choice for purchasing holiday meal ingredients.
Numerator's survey found that 61% of consumers will be cooking at home this Thanksgiving.
Nearly every family across the U.S. will celebrate Thanksgiving this year with more Americans planning to cook at home, a new consumer survey from Numerator revealed.
Speaking with 4,500 consumers in September, more than 9 in 10 said they will be partaking in the American holiday. This year, 61% said they will cook and bake, up from 54% in 2022. Additionally 16% said they will travel for the holiday, up from 11% in the previous year.
With a larger number of Americans planning to celebrate the November holiday, 88% are planning to purchase food for their celebrations and one-third will be buying alcohol.
Other notable results from the survey include:
- Gen Z and Millennials (21%) are the most likely generations to travel this Thanksgiving.
- Consumers in the Midwest are most likely to attend or host gatherings (70%).
- The most popular food items consumers expect to purchase are a turkey or turkey breast (59%), dinner rolls or bread (54%), holiday pies (52%), stuffing/dressing (50%) and vegetables (48%).
- Consumers in the Western U.S. are twice as likely to purchase seafood or meat alternatives for Thanksgiving, compared to other regions.
- More than three-quarters (76%) of consumers plan to buy their Thanksgiving items at grocery stores, followed by mass retailers such as Walmart or Target (37%) and club retailers such as Costco or Sam’s Club (29%).
- Among those who plan to purchase alcoholic beverages for their celebrations, 70% plan to buy wine, followed by beer (57%) and spirits (28%).
- Turkey buying is returning to pre-pandemic norms. In the month leading up to Thanksgiving 2019, 29.7% of U.S. households purchased turkey. That number spiked to 37% in 2020, but slid back to 31.1% in 2022.
