Consumers Are Ditching White Bread For Wheat Bread

Rejoice Michael Pollan, it’s finally happening: wheat bread is almost more popular than white bread. Consumers are increasingly skipping past the Wonderbread for healthier-looking fare that either has “natural” in the name or whole grains visible through the packaging.

It’s part of a major turning of the tide. Packaged wheat bread recently surpassed white bread in dollar sales, according to Nielsen Co. For the 52 weeks ended July 10, wheat bread sales increased 0.6 percent to $2.6 billion, while white bread sales declined 7 percent to $2.5 billion. White bread is still ahead in volume, but the margin is shrinking. Americans bought 1.5 billion packages of white bread in the last year, a 3 percent decrease, and 1.3 billion packages of wheat bread, a 5 percent increase.

We find it tough to believe. Back in our day, white bread was what you ate to fight communists. Peanut butter and jelly on wheat bread? Please. Now, consumers care about what is cheap and what is healthy. How about you? Are you ditching white for wheat?

Grains make gains: Wheat surpasses white in sliced bread sales [Chicago Tribune]

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