That’s because more consumers took to online grocery shopping and leaned more heavily on apps like Instacart and meal kit companies like HelloFresh and Blue Apron. “While we do expect grocery app user growth to decelerate this year, to 5.8%, this is a reversal of our previous predictions for 2021,” said Cindy Liu, eMarketer director of forecasting at Insider Intelligence.

Meal-kit sales likewise exploded in 2020 and are expected to hit $19.9 billion in the US by 2027. Meanwhile, Mastercard’s QuickBooks and Zoho Marketing rewards offer digital solutions that might appeal to small businesses: 30% of them have begun to digitize their business functions, per Visa.

Meal kits are experiencing an uptick in popularity as more people practice social distancing and turn to alternatives to limit their grocery store shopping.

Busy, dual-income households increasingly demand time-saving meals, but don't want to sacrifice quality. For many, the go-to solution has been meal kits, which marketers have touted as healthy, convenient alternatives to traditional home cooking.

Over the past few weeks, online grocery stores and meal kits have seen a stream of orders coming in, not only from existing customers, but also new ones looking to avoid physical stores during the pandemic. Plant-based meal company Splendid Spoon is one of those receiving demand.

eMarketer principal analysts Andrew Lipsman and Nicole Perrin discuss a recent report from The Wall Street Journal indicating that Amazon tweaked its algorithm to favor profitable, Amazon-branded products, the significance of consumers scaling back spending post-summer sales, Americans’ thoughts on meal kits and more.

Smaller shares said they’d give home delivery of cooked meals, meal kits, and fresh ingredients a first try. In the week ending March 8, 2020, home delivery of CPG products in France was 72.2% higher than in the same period in 2019, per Nielsen, and curbside pickup of CPG product orders rose by nearly 30% year over year.

Food service beyond grocery will shape up differently post-pandemic, with a wider variety of options supplementing the patronizing of sit-down restaurants, including meal kit delivery and ordering food online directly and via third-party aggregators' apps.

Consumers are constantly in search of convenience, particularly in the form of timesaving. In the past 12 months, numerous direct-to-consumer (D2C) meal plan services have emerged, offering consumers an alternative solution to home cooking without paying a dreaded visit to the grocery store—or spending time trying to figure out a recipe.

Overall, consumers are turning to some iteration of online grocery to meet their needs, whether it’s through a company’s website or by subscribing to meal kits.