If you are deep into foodservice sales and marketing, you know what non-comm. means. If you aren’t, this quick look at important segments within the foodservice channel is still worth a couple minutes of your time.  

Non-commercial food service establishments serve food and beverages, but they are not the primary business. Think K-12 schools, college and university food halls, feeding workers at a plant or office building, or in-patient feeding at hospitals. While most of us more frequently think about commercial restaurants, like a Chick-Fil-A, or McDonald’s, the non-commercial segment is hugely important to food manufacturers.

Attention to non-comm. segments typically increase during recessions as consumers reduce visits to restaurants to eat at home. That is what happened in 2024 when price hikes by commercial restaurants due to inflated food and labor costs drove customers away. While there are signs of  traffic returning to restaurants, some microtrends are seeing a non-comm. bounce back.

Circana, a leading data analytics firm that monitors case sales of food manufacturers to all foodservice operators by big distributors recently released projected case sales through 2027, and here is what they found.

Outpacing all growth segments is Business & Industry at nearly 15%. The projection is driven by a continued move to order employees back to the workplace. According to a new survey by Resume Builder, 9 in 10 companies will have returned to office by 2025. The survey results are based on data from 764 companies that transitioned to a fully remote work model during the pandemic.  

The Trump Administration is likewise ordering Federal workers back to the workplace, affecting about 230,000 employees. Other non-commercial growth segments are lodging and casinos and the growth of eatertainment venues that combine games with food.

The education and healthcare segments are likewise destined for superior case sales growth more than the commercial sector, driven by increased enrollment, especially graduate students and vocational and trade schools. For healthcare, an aging population sees growth in senior living and long-term care through 2027.

While the commercial segment is more than twice as large in case sales (4.2 billion cases vs. 1.99 billion), the projected uptick in non-commercial food sales is worthy of added marketing and sales focus for the next two years.

For some of Creative Energy’s clients, the non-commercial segments are an important part of their business. There are more barriers to selling into non-commercial segments that our clients are overcoming. Most notable is that about 65% of non-commercial operations are run by contract management companies, such as the Compass Group, Sodexho, and Aramark. Many of these firms have buying groups that must be navigated before sales can occur.

For the K-12 segment, Federal requirements on nutrition means that special formulations of food products are needed that contain lower sodium, no high fructose corn syrup, and whole grains as ingredients.. 

The best that can be said for the non-commercial channel is that once a food manufacturer meets purchasing and nutritional nuisances, it can be a stable, and according to Circana, a growing sector that is outpacing the commercial sector for the next two years.

Creative Energy is helping many clients navigate a path toward the non-commercial sector. If you are in search of your path, let’s talk.