NEW YORK -- Beyond convenience stores, gas stations and truckstops, meat snacks are turning up everywhere from the aisles of Whole Foods to"jerky outlets" to West Village boutiques.
"It's really going from a convenience-store road trip item almost to an hors d'oeuvre," Sherry Frey, vice president of Nielsen Perishables group, told The Huffington Post.
Growth in sales for meat snacks, a broad category that includes everything from Slim Jims to bars made of dried meat and mixed fruit, far exceeded the growth of more traditional snacks like chips, candy and nuts last year, according to data from Nielsen.
Between 2009 and September of this year, total dollar sales in the category grew from $1.58 billion to nearly $2.5 billion, according to data from IRIWorldwide, an analytics and consulting firm.
According to Frey, Americans' renewed hunger for protein is behind snacks' explosive success. Increasingly health-conscious shoppers are becoming more aware of what they put in their bodies, and they're getting the message from the media and the health and wellness community that protein is a better source of fuel than fats, sugars or carbs, she said.
Click here to view the full Huffington Post report.
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