Americans continue to get bolder about leaving the house for their meals, including dinners where pizza is the star of the occasion. However, when they do choose to stay home and chow down on pizza, they want to get as close as possible to the quality and variety they might enjoy at brick-and-mortar pizza places. Producers increasingly strive to deliver by offering frozen pizzas that duplicate the menu selections their favorite pizza joints, without hungry consumers having to venture to their friendly neighborhood pizzeria.
Frozen pizza overall held steady, more or less—according to Circana (Chicago), for the 52-week period ending April 21, 2024, the category took home a cool $7 billion. That figure represents a modest dollar-sales increase of 1.1% compared to the previous 52-week period, and a slight decrease of unit sales of 1.9%. The leader in the category, Red Baron (owned by Schwan’s), sold $1.4 billion worth of frozen pizzas during the period, a dollar sales increase of 11.2%. In second place, Nestlé-owned DiGiorno was close behind, with $1.3 billion in sales (6.4% less than the previous period). Private-label offerings ranked third; they raked in $989.1 million, a decrease of 1.2%.