One would be hard pressed to name a food product that’s more popular than the all-American hamburger. Billions of burgers are consumed annually at a variety of foodservice venues. And 9 billion pounds of ground beef is sold each year in the U.S. and consumed in approximately 97 percent of American households. Much of this volume is dedicated to making hamburgers,Get more news about Cuber Perforator Machine,you can vist our website!
“The dominant beef item in both foodservice and retail is the hamburger. It’s actually by a larger margin in foodservice because of quick-service restaurants [QSRs],” says Randy Irion, director of retail marketing, National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA).
More than 42 percent of total beef manufactured at retail is sold as ground beef, he continues.
“Most retail ground beef sold today is ground at the plant level. A minority of that product is ground at store level,” Irion adds. “Ground beef patties make up a fairly smaller percentage of the total.”
Ground beef comes in many grinds and brands. For example, on an annual basis licensed packers produce 68.5 million pounds of Certified Angus Beef® (CAB) ground beef. This includes ground round, ground chuck, ground sirloin, and non sub-primal specific grinds, says John Sticka, vice president of business development, Certified Angus Beef. “Our 80/20 ground chuck is our most popular program.”
When asked about the amount of hamburger patties made at processing plants, Sticka says that’s difficult to decipher.
“We know of that 68.5 million pounds, 45.6 million pounds is direct packer processed products – the Tysons, Cargills, Nationals, and Swifts of the world that sell that product in 10-pound chubs. We don’t know how much of that ends up in patty form. A number of our retailers will buy 10-pound chubs and slice quarter-pound or third-pound patties and present them in a family-pack or multi-pack product in the retail case,” he adds.
Just under 23 million pounds of CAB ground beef is generated at midstream by ground beef processors or grinding facilities. And virtually all this product will end up in patty form at foodservice, Sticka says.
“We have seen a number of foodservice distributors move away from grinding or manufacturing their own patties – either fresh or frozen—so that business has become concentrated within the grinding segment of companies that specialize solely in ground beef processing and patty making,” he adds.
The continuing growth of CAB ground beef programs is just one indicator on the growing popularity of ground beef. That 68.5 million pounds represents a 15-percent increase over the previous year, Sticka boasts.