Breakfast Is Hotter Than Ever

As you may have read, Quiznos—yet another restaurant traditionally associated with lunch—is making the move to offer breakfast. Subway started testing the breakfast waters a while ago with an expanded morning menu in more locations, and Dunkin’ Donuts—which had quite a year in 2009,opening 351 new locations last year and is gearing up for more of the same this year, focusing on untapped markets—has diversified its A.M. offerings a while back (we reported on one of their flatbread egg-white omelets last year in CULINOOGY®). Caribou and Starbucks are perpetually on the breakfast attack, with the former particularly active in its branding and expanded offerings of late. Even McDonald’s is shaking things up by getting into the oatmeal game (in the wake of Caribou, Starbucks and even Jamba Juice jumping on the steel-cut bandwagon). In fact, few weeks can pass without some sort of foodservice breakfast-related story hitting the virtual newsstand.

All of this attention may seem a bit overzealous if you caught the recent Mintel release on this subject, which makes a nod to the fact that breakfast is hotter than ever while also noting declining sales and fewer consumer food dollars pointed restaurants’ way in the A.M. But if you keep reading through the Mintel release, you’ll see that this is just the beginning. The market-research firm predicts a 13% expansion of the breakfast market by 2014.

First off, breakfast is cheap. When foodservice operators consider breakfast vs. lunch or dinner, it’s really apples and oranges … no real comparison. People are in and out. Much of the business is carry-out vs. dine-in. Ingredients are cheaper and overhead is low. And it’s cheaper for consumers, too. Many need to get some sort of regular foodservice fix, and with indefinitely constrained budgets, morning can seem more attractive than night.

Considering how competitive foodservice is these days, expanding into the morning daypart is quite attractive. All of the previous bets are off in the restaurant world as consumers shift restaurant segments at will, playing more of the field with their away-from-home food dollars than ever before. Economic realities may have expanded their range of acceptability when it comes to dining out, but it has also expanded their horizons. They’ve played the field, and they like what they see. Now it’s each operator’s task to keep those diners coming through the doors.

Our end of the business can clearly help with new formulation tacks on traditional breakfast items, spinning some in a healthier direction while adding high-end culinary appeal to others—all the while with a close eye on convenience and cost.

Following all of this breakfast brouhaha should prove exciting for the indefinite future.