Traditional Food Statistics: Access, Consumption, and Retail Patterns

Traditional food statistics at a glance

Traditional food statistics show a split story.

At the retail end, U.S. food stores are large, consolidated, and highly concentrated (USDA ERS Retail Trends). At the community end, several studies point to limited access, shifting habits, and strong cultural ties that still keep traditional foods important in daily life (multiple source studies in the statistics dataset).

Quick takeaways

• U.S. food stores numbered 115,526 in 2019 (USDA ERS Retail Trends).
• Those stores sold $717 billion of retail food and nonfood products in 2019 (USDA ERS Retail Trends).
• Grocery stores accounted for 92.1% of total store sales in 2019 (USDA ERS Retail Trends).
• The 20 largest food retailers accounted for 65.1% of total food sales in 2019, up from 35.0% in 1990 (USDA ERS Retail Trends).
• In one Zimbabwe study, 9.3% consumed traditional foods daily and 20.0% had never consumed them (Facilitators and barriers to the consumption of traditional foods among adults in Zimbabwe).
• In a Saskatchewan Indigenous survey, 53.6% said they rarely or never eat Indigenous traditional foods such as fish, wild meat, or berries (Exploring the Implications of COVID-19 on Food Security and Coping Strategies among Urban Indigenous Peoples in Saskatchewan, Canada).
• In a Northern Territory Aboriginal study, traditional foods were reported as available year-round in all 20 communities studied (Traditional food availability and consumption in remote Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory, Australia).

Contents

1. Retail market structure
2. What the percentages say about access
3. Community and household patterns
4. A compact comparison table
5. What these numbers imply for a cuisine website

Retail market structure behind traditional food sales

Traditional food statistics are not only about eating patterns. They also sit inside a much larger food retail system, and that system helps explain why availability, pricing, and distribution matter so much.

In 2019, U.S. food stores numbered 115,526 and sold $717 billion of retail food and nonfood products (USDA ERS Retail Trends). That is a very large marketplace, but it is also one where sales are not evenly spread across store types.

Grocery stores accounted for 92.1% of total store sales in 2019 (USDA ERS Retail Trends). Convenience stores without gasoline accounted for 4.6% of total store sales, while specialized food stores accounted for 3.3% (USDA ERS Retail Trends). Those shares matter because traditional food shoppers do not experience “food retail” as one single space. They experience neighborhoods, store types, product assortments, and the practical question of whether the foods they want are actually available where they live.

Sales concentration also changed over time. The 20 largest food retailers totaled $410.4 billion in sales in 2019 and accounted for 65.1% of total food sales (USDA ERS Retail Trends). That share was 35.0% in 1990, which means it rose by 85.9% in share terms from 1990 to 2019 (USDA ERS Retail Trends). The dataset also notes that the share held by the top 8 retailers rose for 5 consecutive years from 2012 to 2017, the share held by the top 20 retailers rose for 5 consecutive years from 2012 to 2017, and the share held by the top 4 retailers rose every year since 2012 (USDA ERS Retail Trends).

Those are not just corporate facts. They indicate that a small set of retailers can strongly shape what food is stocked, how it is displayed, and which products are normalized as mainstream. For cuisines that rely on particular ingredients, that kind of concentration can influence whether shoppers find familiar foods in ordinary places or need to search specialized outlets.

Growth rates add another layer

The USDA ERS Retail Trends dataset also gives long-run growth rates for grocery-store food sales. From 2000 to 2009, grocery-store food sales growth averaged -0.19% per year (USDA ERS Retail Trends). From 2010 to 2019, the same measure averaged 1.31% per year (USDA ERS Retail Trends).

That shift suggests a retail environment that was stronger in the 2010s than in the prior decade. For a traditional foods conversation, the important point is not the exact growth rate alone. It is that the retail system supporting ingredient access can change over time, and those changes can influence how easy it is for households to sustain food traditions.

What the percentages say about access

The non-retail studies in the dataset focus more directly on consumption, barriers, and facilitators. Taken together, they show that traditional food habits are shaped by culture, location, family, time, and availability.

In the Zimbabwe study, 44.4% of participants said generational factors facilitated traditional food consumption (Facilitators and barriers to the consumption of traditional foods among adults in Zimbabwe). That is a strong signal that food habits are inherited and reinforced across generations. The same study found that 26.2% identified family members as the key community-level facilitator (Facilitators and barriers to the consumption of traditional foods among adults in Zimbabwe). Family is not just part of the context. It is one of the mechanisms that keeps traditional foods alive.

The barriers are equally important. In that same Zimbabwe study, 33.2% identified inconvenience in accessing and preparing traditional foods as the top individual-level barrier, 31.8% named residential location as the top community-level barrier, and 47.8% cited aggressive marketing of processed foods as the top national-level barrier (Facilitators and barriers to the consumption of traditional foods among adults in Zimbabwe). Those three numbers point to a layered problem. Even if someone values traditional foods, access may be limited by geography, convenience, and the broader marketing environment.

The consumption distribution in Zimbabwe also shows how uneven routine intake can be. Only 9.3% consumed traditional foods daily, while 20.0% had never consumed traditional foods (Facilitators and barriers to the consumption of traditional foods among adults in Zimbabwe). That is a wide gap between daily use and complete non-use, which suggests very different relationships to traditional cuisine within the same population.

Community and cultural continuity still matter

Another pattern appears in the Northern Territory Aboriginal study. Traditional food availability was reported as year-round in all 20 communities studied (Traditional food availability and consumption in remote Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory, Australia). Even more striking, 89% of participants reported consuming a variety of traditional foods at least fortnightly, and 71% reported consuming a variety of traditional foods at least weekly (Traditional food availability and consumption in remote Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory, Australia).

The same study found that 76% of participants were food insecure, while 40% obtained traditional food during times of food insecurity (Traditional food availability and consumption in remote Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory, Australia). That combination matters. It shows that traditional foods can serve as both a cultural resource and a practical food-security resource.

In the Alaska Native WIC study, 70% of participants said they followed a traditional way of life somewhat, and 11% said they followed it a lot (Traditional Food Practices, Attitudes, and Beliefs in Urban Alaska Native Women Receiving WIC Assistance). The study also listed several barriers: 8 participants cited living in an urban area, 5 cited lack of transportation for hunting, fishing, or gathering, 5 cited work demands or lack of time, 4 cited license or legal restrictions, 4 cited family commitments, 3 cited not knowing how to hunt or fish, 2 cited a general lack of traditional food availability, 2 cited competition with non-Natives, and 1 cited environmental changes (Traditional Food Practices, Attitudes, and Beliefs in Urban Alaska Native Women Receiving WIC Assistance).

This is a useful reminder that traditional food systems are not only about preference. They depend on time, skills, mobility, land access, legal access, and the ability to transmit practices across generations. When any one of those parts weakens, the food pattern weakens with it.

How often people actually eat traditional foods

The Saskatchewan Indigenous survey adds a different urban perspective. More than half of respondents, 53.6%, said they rarely or never eat Indigenous traditional foods such as fish, wild meat, or berries (Exploring the Implications of COVID-19 on Food Security and Coping Strategies among Urban Indigenous Peoples in Saskatchewan, Canada). At the same time, 22.2% ate Indigenous traditional foods once per week, 20.2% ate them 2-4 times per week, 1.0% ate them 5-6 times per week, and 3.0% ate them at least once per day (Exploring the Implications of COVID-19 on Food Security and Coping Strategies among Urban Indigenous Peoples in Saskatchewan, Canada).

The same survey also shows how people describe their food mix. 20.6% reported only store-bought foods and little to no traditional foods, 41.2% reported mostly store-bought foods and some traditional foods, 21.7% reported about the same amount of traditional and store-bought foods, and 13.4% reported mostly traditional foods and some store-bought foods (Exploring the Implications of COVID-19 on Food Security and Coping Strategies among Urban Indigenous Peoples in Saskatchewan, Canada).

That split is important because it shows that traditional food consumption is rarely all-or-nothing. It is often blended with store-bought foods. For a cuisine site, that means the story is not only “do people eat traditional foods?” but “how do traditional foods fit into modern household routines?”

Compact comparison table

Study or dataset	Main traditional food signal	Key statistic
USDA ERS Retail Trends	Market concentration	20 largest food retailers held 65.1% of total food sales in 2019 (USDA ERS Retail Trends)
Zimbabwe study	Daily consumption	9.3% consumed traditional foods daily (Facilitators and barriers to the consumption of traditional foods among adults in Zimbabwe)
Zimbabwe study	Complete non-use	20.0% had never consumed traditional foods (Facilitators and barriers to the consumption of traditional foods among adults in Zimbabwe)
Saskatchewan Indigenous survey	Low-frequency use	53.6% rarely or never eat Indigenous traditional foods (Exploring the Implications of COVID-19 on Food Security and Coping Strategies among Urban Indigenous Peoples in Saskatchewan, Canada)
Saskatchewan Indigenous survey	Mixed household diets	41.2% reported mostly store-bought foods and some traditional foods (Exploring the Implications of COVID-19 on Food Security and Coping Strategies among Urban Indigenous Peoples in Saskatchewan, Canada)
Northern Territory Aboriginal study	Ongoing availability	Traditional foods were available year-round in all 20 communities (Traditional food availability and consumption in remote Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory, Australia)
Northern Territory Aboriginal study	Regular use	71% reported consuming a variety of traditional foods at least weekly (Traditional food availability and consumption in remote Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory, Australia)
Alaska Native WIC study	Urban barriers	Urban area, transportation, time, legal restrictions, and family commitments all appeared as barriers (Traditional Food Practices, Attitudes, and Beliefs in Urban Alaska Native Women Receiving WIC Assistance)

Reading the numbers together

The strongest insight across the dataset is that traditional food patterns are shaped by both system-level and household-level forces. Retail concentration is high in the United States, with grocery stores accounting for 92.1% of store sales and the top 20 food retailers holding 65.1% of total food sales in 2019 (USDA ERS Retail Trends). At the same time, multiple community studies show that access and routine consumption depend on far more than retail shelves.

The Zimbabwe findings combine cultural transmission with structural barriers. The family and generational numbers are meaningful because they show that traditional foods are socially maintained. The inconvenience, residential-location, and processed-food-marketing numbers are meaningful because they show that maintenance is not effortless. When 47.8% of respondents name aggressive marketing of processed foods as the top national-level barrier, the issue is clearly broader than individual choice alone (Facilitators and barriers to the consumption of traditional foods among adults in Zimbabwe).

The Saskatchewan survey shows how modern urban life can compress traditional food use into a narrower band of frequency. A majority rarely or never eat these foods, yet a substantial minority still eats them weekly or more often (Exploring the Implications of COVID-19 on Food Security and Coping Strategies among Urban Indigenous Peoples in Saskatchewan, Canada). That means traditional food culture can persist even where it is not dominant.

The Northern Territory study pushes the interpretation in the other direction. It shows strong availability and high regular use, even amid food insecurity (Traditional food availability and consumption in remote Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory, Australia). Traditional foods there are not a niche memory. They are part of the food system itself.

What a cuisine website can do with these statistics

For a cuisine site, these statistics support several content angles without needing to stretch the data. You can frame traditional food pages around continuity, access, regional variation, and the role of family knowledge. You can also separate retail availability from actual consumption. Those are not the same thing. A food can be widely available in a market and still be eaten infrequently in daily life. A food can also be hard to access commercially and still remain culturally central because it is harvested, shared, or prepared at home.

The dataset also suggests a useful editorial balance. Use the retail numbers when you want to explain the commercial environment. Use the household and survey numbers when you want to show lived behavior. Keep both in view and the story becomes more precise.

A short source map for the main facts

• USDA ERS Retail Trends: store counts, store sales, grocery share, retailer concentration, and grocery sales growth.
• Facilitators and barriers to the consumption of traditional foods among adults in Zimbabwe: generational facilitators, family support, barriers, and frequency of use.
• Exploring the Implications of COVID-19 on Food Security and Coping Strategies among Urban Indigenous Peoples in Saskatchewan, Canada: frequency of eating Indigenous traditional foods and the balance between store-bought and traditional foods.
• Traditional Food Practices, Attitudes, and Beliefs in Urban Alaska Native Women Receiving WIC Assistance: traditional lifestyle self-ratings and barriers to access.
• Traditional food availability and consumption in remote Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory, Australia: availability, frequency, and food insecurity context.
• Development of a Quantitative Food Frequency Questionnaire for Use among the Yup’ik People of Western Alaska: recall counts, participant mix, and traditional-food reporting frequency.