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the current pace of life demands speedy solutions from the food industry. the ready meals market in western europe, one of the strongest performing areas of the food sector worth €7.3 billion in 2001, is set to grow to €8.7 billion by 2006. a new consumer insight programme, the result of consumer surveys, focus groups and interviews from market analysts datamonitor, presents ten key consumer insights for ready meal, prepared pizza and meal kit players. according to datamonitor there are five consumer trends that are currently affecting ready meal sales. firstly, helping consumers deal with already high and rising levels of stress. stress affects the way consumers make grocery decisions and stress-driven consumption, claims datamonitor, is a factor of the consumers' desire for familiar and convenient products, impatience with mundane tasks and unwillingness to experiment when reacting to stress. in europe, stress-driven consumption of ready meals has grown by 5.6 per cent between 1996 and 2001 to reach a value of €2.7 billion. the fastest growth has been in italy, followed by the uk. currently, 47 per cent of europeans suffer from significant levels of stress ranging from mildly stressed to severely stressed and is set to grow considerably. as stress levels rise, manufacturers and retailers can appeal to stressed consumers in two ways. the first is to help out the consumer at the moment of stress by offering products which are more convenient or will otherwise help them to cope with stress. the second is to offer products that help consumers to wind down from stressful episodes. moving on to the second trend, the home is increasingly the castle as more consumers choose to entertain at home, writes datamonitor. entertaining guests at home is becoming increasingly popular and the dinner party culture has evolved over the last few years - gatherings have become more frequent and less formal. growth in the number of gatherings over the next five years will be minimal, but spending on gatherings, claims the analysts, will increase significantly as consumers trade-up to premium products. there are two key opportunities within the party market for convenience products. firstly, consumers who already usually prepare food for gatherings, but will increasingly seek time-saving options to allow them to focus more closely on other areas of preparation such as themselves or their homes. secondly, hosts who do not currently usually serve food, through lack of experience or avoidance of effort, could be encouraged to serve food through high-quality low-effort ready meal solutions. the third trend is snacking. breakfast, lunch and dinner are no longer seen as being as important as they were a generation ago. on average every european will eat 11 fewer meals per year by 2006. however, they will snack on average 19 more times per year to compensate for this. looking at differences between the sexes, datamonitor found that women are more likely to skip lunch or dinner but will snack more throughout the day. the changes in eating habits are important for convenience food manufacturers - they will need to provide a more varied and nutritional range of snacking options as well as convenient small meals that are targeted at consumers throughout the day, rather than at specific mealtimes. going out in the evening is no longer a luxury but more of a routine, writes datamonitor when describing the fourth trend. going out to eat or drink in the evening is increasingly habitual - part of a regular routine, and not a special treat. prompted by busier lifestyles, consumers are seeking "value-for-time" instead of just "value-for-money". in 2001 the average consumer in europe went out to eat 1.4 times per week, but the split between the week and weekend is crucial. food manufacturers must recognise, adds datamonitor, that consumers will increasingly divert more of their meal occasions towards ‘out-of-home’ ie. eating out, channels. this makes it even more important for manufacturers to establish footholds in the foodservice market, not only to benefit from a growth area, but also to increase their ability to spot trends occurring in foodservice that will increasingly affect consumers' choices in the retail sector, especially in prepared meals. finally, the ‘fear of ageing’. according to datamonitor, more than ever before this affects consumers of all ages. inevitable shifts in wealth, social situation, occupation and health occur throughout consumer's lives. the general effect of fear of ageing on food spending is to decrease spending on ready meals in favour of raw ingredients which can be used to cook from scratch. the report from datamonitor goes on to list five consumer groups that the food manufacturer should be targeting. firstly, organic food buyers. according to datamonitor this is a growing group that tends to fall into one of two groups. those who buy into the ‘organic ethos’ whole-heartedly and shift as much of their shopping as possible over to organic products; and those who buy organics every now and then, seeing organics as healthier or more prestige products and typically buying them because of their current ‘fashionability’. in 2001, ‘loyal’ organic consumers accounted for 5 per cent of europeans but accounted for 69 per cent of spending on organic foods, whereas ‘occasional’ organic consumers accounted for 31 per cent of europeans. convenience organic foods have potential among both groups although marketing of ready meals should be tailored to each group. the second consumer group is the increasing numbers of c-store shoppers searching for convenience foods. the propensity to ‘top-up shop’ is increasing as more hectic lifestyles mean that consumers make less accurate assessments of what they need when they make their weekly shopping lists. convenience stores are the biggest beneficiary of this trend with visits to c-stores set to increase by 7.9 per cent between 2001 and 2006. this channel is therefore key to target with convenience goods such as ready meals. however, marketers should be aware that the majority of c-store customers are from the cde social classes not the ‘cash rich time poor’. homeworkers value meal kits rather than ready meals, cites datamonitor as the third consumer group. apparently there were 26 million homeworkers in europe in the year 2000 and they consume and behave in different ways to the rest of the workforce. over the period 2000-05 the number of homeworkers in europe will increase by 53 per cent to reach a total of almost 40 million people. the biggest impact of this will be on the lunchtime food market as homeworkers switch from foodservice and ready-to-eat food to prepare-your-own products. however, for the evening meal, homeworkers are more likely to spend time cooking more complicated meals and therefore value high quality meal components and raw ingredients at the expense of ready meals. datamonitor stressed that there is a real opportunity to build a premium, value-added meal kit business serving this market. the fourth group is the speciality and gourmet shopper looking for the best. speciality foods are flourishing across europe as consumers become increasingly uninspired by mass-produced food. core speciality food shoppers are affluent, urban, internationally orientated, work in professional, quasi-professional or media types. according to datamonitor this will change in future as the grocery multiples bring the speciality sector to a wider audience. above all, speciality shoppers crave four things from their food - taste, variety, freshness and authenticity. manufacturers can target this group with higher quality or 'gourmet' ready meals. lastly, young families form the fifth consumer group. young families (those with a single child under two years old) are forecast to decline across europe by an average of 0.4 per cent per annum between 2001 and 2006. despite this, increasing economic welfare and changing attitudes towards child rearing will continue to cause changes in the value of the young family market. following the birth of a first child, the opposing forces of both increasing time pressure and health concerns lead to greater spend on fresh, organic and convenience foods. in particular, low income young families show the strongest demand for convenience products such as prepared meals. this recent research from datamonitor is part of the new consumer insight (nci) series.