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Are shoppable recipes a bigger opportunity than meal kits?

Written by Tom Ryan

Source: EatLove

While meal kits have earned more buzz, a similar yet simpler option gaining traction are online shoppable recipes, as with those being pushed currently by Amazon. In mid-November, AmazonFresh partnered with EatLove, the personalized nutrition platform and meal planning service, as one of its first recipe integration providers. Analyzing an individual’s nutrition, health and lifestyle goals, food allergies as well as personal tastes and preferences, EatLove’s platform creates a customized meal plan for the week, complete with an optimized grocery list and recipes. Customers check off the ingredients they already have at home, and order remaining grocery items through AmazonFresh. EatLove CEO Monique Nadeau said in a statement, “Our advanced algorithms can instantly analyze more than three million dietary factors to create the perfect meal plan and grocery list, optimized across the week's recipes ensuring ‘meal kit’ efficiencies at less than half the cost.” The cost savings come from the use of standard grocery packaging versus the need to measure and individually bag ingredients in recipe portions as meal kits do. Shoppable recipe services also aid in recipe discovery and save time versus finding all the ingredients at a grocery store. Amazon has also recently partnered with Allrecipes and Fexy Media, owner of Serious Eats and Simply Recipes. Many other grocers have likewise integrated meal planning and purchasing through similar partnerships or on their own. eMeals, the first meal kit solution to integrate with online grocery programs, recently added AmazonFresh to its lineup of partners that includes Walmart, Kroger, ClickList and Instacart. Subscribers pick among 100 new weekly recipe options, a shopping list is automatically generated, and home delivery is scheduled. Kroger and Walmart also offer store pickup. The service likewise promises up to 50 percent savings in per-serving food costs compared to conventional meal kit providers. Said eMeals CEO Forrest Collier, "Adding AmazonFresh to our fulfillment lineup expands our reach to most of the top players in online grocery and advances our mission of giving customers more choice, flexibility and affordability than any other meal kit service."

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