New figures from Kantar show the lamb market thrived in the 12 weeks to 16th May 2021, but primary beef sales declined compared with the high spending levels of the March 2020 lockdown.
Compared to the same period last year, value sales of fresh primary meat and poultry dipped by 4.3%. Primary beef sales were down 8.7% in value terms and 12.2% in volume.
Chicken and turkey both entered year on year value decline, and pork also fell after growth of 8.8% in the previous period.
Lamb, however, saw value sales up by 10.5%, which Kantar stated was largely as a result of shoppers paying higher prices. Lamb underperformed in 2020, but value sales still increased 7.5% on the same period in 2019.
More people bought lamb, with 130,000 additional shoppers compared to the same period last year and almost 250,000 more than 2019.
Jim McKenna, client executive at Kantar, said: "We expect to see primary red meat continue to struggle to match the record highs of 2020, as shoppers return to hospitality outlets over the summer and focus more on burgers and sausages for barbecues."
With 15 million fewer barbecue occasions in April 2021 than in the same month last year, sausages were among the classics to be impacted, with value and volume sales falling by more than 12%.
However, Kantar expects barbecue-related categories to pick up sales in the coming months to coincide with sporting events and summer weather.
This story was originally published on a previous version of the Meat Management website and so there may be some missing images and formatting issues.
