The latest figures from Kantar suggest that the three categories have continued to retain the majority of the additional spend achieved in previous years.

While the in-home market is 7.1% down on last year in value due to the re-emergence of out-of-home options, it is still 5.3% ahead of the equivalent period in 2019.

According to Kantar, beating the impact of lockdown and last year’s recorded boost to MFP purchases was hard to achieve from the outset. Yet, the latest figures show growth in convenience-focussed sectors, which struggled in 2020. Sliced cooked meats, for example, experienced 2.3% growth, while processed poultry is up 6.1%.

Alex McDonald, client manager at Kantar, said: “Categories such as burgers and sausages, which benefitted the most from increasing in-home eating occasions during lockdown, have both held on to more than half of their gains from 2020. Whilst there has been some movement back towards traditional shopping habits over the last few months, when it comes to MFP buying behaviour, it is still very different to what it was before the beginning of the pandemic.”

Fresh meat free remains a major growth area, with what Kantar has termed “a strong pipeline of innovation.” This sector has grown by 70% since the summer of 2019 and over the last 12 weeks, it has become a £70 million market, with products bought by six million shoppers. Despite the growth of many own label ranges, brands still have a strong share of chilled meat free (71%). Kantar said that this is one of the highest recorded brand shares anywhere in fresh foods.

Chilled fish has also had a very strong summer – 12% ahead of its 2019 position and 4.6% ahead of its 2020 position. The figures showed that there has been particularly strong growth in battered fish (11%) and added value products (21%).