In the Wall Street Journal, Sarah Nassauer mentions a stunning statistic:
Chobani Inc. burst onto the scene in 2007 when Greek yogurt made up about 1% of the yogurt selection on shelves, a company spokeswoman says. Now it’s the largest seller of Greek yogurt in the U.S. and Greek makes up about 35% of all yogurt on shelves, the spokeswoman says…. Over half of U.S. households bought Greek over the last 12 months, according to data from retail research firm IRI, provided by Stonyfield, the largest organic yogurt brand in the U.S.
Nine years ago the Weekly Standard published a column by Max Boot on his love for Fage, a brand of Greek yogurt. Boot was concerned about a recall of the brand at Trader Joe’s, which turned out to be temporary. Today it would be unimaginable. As the Journal notes:
Today yogurt takes up about 2.2 million linear feet of grocery store shelf space in the U.S., up from about 1.9 million two years ago. During that time, space allotted to Greek yogurt at U.S. grocery stores increased to about 631,000 linear feet, up from about 163,000 in 2011, reducing space for non-Greek products by about 12%, according to IRI data from Stonyfield.
I remember at the time thinking Boot’s raving about Greek yogurt was a bit silly. Who ever heard of Greek yogurt, let alone one named Fage (pronounced fa-yeh)? Of course Fage 2 percent Honey is now my favorite, especially when mixed with Bear Naked Fit granola. But not to worry, I only eat this once or twice a week. The rest of the time it’s steak ‘n’ eggs, I swear!