Bananas have the highest household penetration of all fruits and have long served as the anchor of the produce department. That doesn’t sound like a problem, does it? In fact, it sounds like a cause for celebration.
Without a doubt, the dominant status of bananas in the produce department is a source of envy among other fruits. A quick look at bananas in the context of total fruit sales and a comparison with other high-volume fruits makes this clear.
For another perspective, let’s examine the percent volume change over the past three years for this same set of fruits (see the chart below). Once again, bananas hold a favorable position, showing the least volatility in sales among the comparison group. This consistency makes it easier to forecast and manage the category while providing a sense of security that it can withstand changes, such as the inflation surge in 2022. However, this stability has a downside—bananas have not experienced the kind of recent growth seen in strawberries. In fact, three of the comparison fruits, along with total fruit sales, posted significantly higher growth rates in 2024 than bananas.
Not surprisingly, this stability in sales was mirrored by stability in pricing. A similar chart showing percentage changes in average selling price reveals that bananas exhibited the least fluctuation.
So, with steady pricing, bananas have delivered steady volume. Bananas are starting to sound like a good blue-chip investment: consistent performance with minimal risk. But how high is high? Can’t bananas show growth the way other fruits have?
Things I Wonder About
To what extent are bananas a habitual purchase? And to what degree is that a good thing? Here’s what we know:
Awareness of bananas is sky-high. The good news for those selling bananas is that they don’t have to fight for positioning in consumers’ minds—they’re already there. So, whatever communications bananas could benefit from to grow sales, an awareness campaign is neither necessary nor beneficial.
What about trial? Trial conversion measures what percentage of shoppers try the product once aware of it. While there isn’t hard data on this conversion, it’s safe to say that the percentage of people who are aware of bananas and have tried them is very high, leaving little room for a meaningful increase. Again, there’s no need for a campaign focused on trial.
The good news for those selling bananas is that they don’t have to fight for positioning in consumers’ minds—they’re already there.
When planning any campaign, the focus can be on either getting people to buy the product more often or getting more people to buy it. A frequency strategy aims to increase how often existing buyers purchase the product, while an incidence strategy focuses on getting new buyers to purchase the product. Given what we know about bananas—extremely high household penetration and awareness—it’s doubtful that efforts to increase the number of buyers would yield much return. At some point, there are diminishing returns in spending to reach a vanishingly small audience of non-users. So, we can rule out an incidence strategy. Instead, banana marketers need to focus on frequency—getting existing buyers to purchase more often.
But wait: if household penetration is already high and bananas are bought frequently, how successful can we be in trying to boost purchases further? Here’s one approach unlikely to succeed: price promotions. Over the past three years, there’s little evidence that demand for bananas moves in lockstep with price, unlike in other areas of the produce department.
What about product innovation? Flavored bananas or self-peeling bananas might be interesting ideas, but they seem risky and unlikely to have a major impact. Instead, I see two more promising approaches: occasion-based strategies and satisfaction-based strategies. The good news is that these can be pursued simultaneously or in combination.
For both strategies, better consumer insights are essential. Let’s start with satisfaction-based strategies. What drives satisfaction for banana buyers? Why do they buy? What experience are they hoping for when they consume bananas? Food manufacturers can easily lose sight of what their products are for—consumption and enjoyment. Banana marketers need to understand what matters most to consumers in the banana-eating experience, which won’t be uniform. I prefer bananas with brown spots, but others, presumably normal people, like to eat them when they’re green.
There’s likely a segmentation model for banana consumers that could help marketers target different groups based on their preferences. Once we understand which consumers value which attributes, we can target the most attractive segments and examine the supply chain to enhance the eating experience for those segments. This type of research empowers growers and retailers to optimize quality for the highest-value audiences—a practical approach.
If banana marketers want to move the needle on consumption, they need to shift their approach.
The second strategy focuses on how consumers use bananas. Do they simply peel and eat? Do they slice bananas over cereal, as they did more frequently in the past? Are bananas mainly used for banana bread when they’re too ripe for regular consumption? Personally, I enjoy Bananas Foster, but no one else in my household does. Again, we need segmentation of high-use consumers. How do the most frequent consumers use bananas? Are there recipes, applications, or life hacks they’ve discovered that, if more widely known, could drive increased consumption?
If banana marketers want to move the needle on consumption, they need to shift their approach. Step one is conducting the necessary research to understand what drives satisfaction and usage. Step two is recognizing that the challenge is not one of price or product design. Instead, the challenge is to connect with consumers by emphasizing what they already enjoy about bananas and highlighting new, appealing ways to use them.
Have bananas grown as much as they can? Don’t believe it for a second.
