Over the past two decades, a lot of changes to human culture have been made. An important area where these changes have been very evident, is in the way we eat. Some few decades ago, we were either eating out or grocery shopping. Whenever we wanted to cook, we were either shopping randomly, or pre-planning our shopping based on the already available ingredients in the kitchen. Grocery stores are usually very large, and navigating through the different sections in search of what we need, can be time consuming. As human development continued, a lot of people joined the working class and the amount of free time they had on their hands, continued to decrease. With technological advances came high speed communication and sharing of ideas. New job opportunities were created, and the modern world was caught up in this high-speed frenzy. In the modern era, millennials are trying to save as much time as
possible, and many people no longer have the time, to go grocery shopping. These needs, necessitated the inception of the meal kit; an alternative to grocery shopping
A meal kit is a package, that contains the necessary ingredients needed to prepare a particular food, and usually comes with a recipe, as pre-ordered by the consumer. They are then delivered by online food delivery services to the consumers. With meal kits, we still get to cook our food but do so in convenience. They help save time, by eliminating the need to go grocery shopping. With meal kits, all the required ingredients come to you. No long hours are spent, navigating through multiple aisles in the grocery store. We spend most of our time at work, but still need quality time for family and friends. In spite of our tight schedules, we can still get to salvage quality time for other important aspects of our lives. They make our cooking more convenient;
the effort put into preplanning a meal is minimized. The responsibility of rationing and shopping, is shifted from the buyers to the meal kit suppliers.
With meal kits, all the needed ingredients are provided. They enable people to cook food, without any existing groceries at home; an excellent solution for people who have just moved into an apartment, but still want to cook.
Another significant advantage they provide, is in the variety of ingredients. Many meal kit suppliers also provide ingredients for foreign cuisines, that are not readily available. For people looking to cook international dishes, the meal kit is the way to go. The recipes they come with are easy to understand, and almost anyone can cook a good meal based on these, without any previous experience.
The Concept of Meal Shopping
Meal kits brought to life, the concept of meal shopping. You are buying the ingredients for just one meal, in the form of a meal kit. This is different from grocery shopping, where we went out to buy different ingredients in bulk. The success of the meal shopping market, can be attributed to the implementation of meal kit sales by Quick Service Restaurants, like Chick-Fil-A. People could now drive through to either pick up cooked food, or meal kits. By convention, grocery shopping requires a lot of planning. You want to shop as efficiently as possible, saving as much time as you can. Wastage of ingredients and money is very common with grocery shoppers, due to lack of foresight and proper planning. A lot of people, end up buying ingredients they won’t use. This is where the meal kit comes in. The consumers get exactly what they need for a particular meal, in the right amount and proportion. Purchase is straightforward, and consumers know exactly what they are getting. They are closer to achieving a meal than the grocery shoppers, who still have to go home and properly ration the ingredients.
In Conclusion
The challenges associated with grocery shopping, coupled with the declining amount of free time available to millennials birthed meal kits. They were created to make meal preparation more convenient, straight forward and less time-consuming. With a little fee, people can have their meal kits delivered to them at home. For people who eat out often, they can also pick up meal kits in their various QSRs. Meal shopping optimizes use of ingredients, and wastage is avoided. The meal kit eases the burden of pre-planning, purchase of ingredients and preparation of a meal, as would be experienced by conventional grocery shoppers.