Consumer Consumption

Consumer Consumption

Consumer choices can have an adverse effect on the success of a business. Understanding the consumer consumption patterns is essential to any profitable business. The meat industry is known for changing the future of consumer consumption. This paper will also recapitulate the article and explain the basis for the trends in consumption patterns in the meat industry.

This paper will define economics, microeconomics, the law of supply, the law of demand, and recognize the factors that led to a change in supply and a change in demand.

Consumption patterns

Global production of meat products continues to change the trade market. Bittman (2008) emphasizes the importance of commodities:

"The two commodities share a great deal: Like oil, meat is subsidized by the federal government. Like oil, meat is subject to accelerating demand as nations become wealthier, and this, in turn, sends prices higher. Finally -- like oil -- meat is something people are encouraged to consume less of, as the toll exacted by industrial production increases, and becomes increasingly visible" (para. 2).

Changing lifestyles, new technologies, and increasing health awareness are patterns in meat that cause change in meat production. According to Britannica Concise Encyclopedia (2010), "economics is the study of how individuals and societies choose to employ those resources: what goods and services will be produced, how they will be produced, and how they will be distributed among the members of society. Economics is customarily divided into microeconomics and macroeconomics." Income changes can drastically impact the demand of meat. The more income people receive, the more people tend to consume meat. Preference in meat selection comes into play when higher incomes are present. A person would choose "beef" instead of "pork." Beef is more expensive and offers quality selections.

Market prices

The availability and pricing of cattle can change the way beef prices are passed onto the consumers. According to Britannica Concise Encyclopedia (2010), "Microeconomics is the study of the economic behavior of individual consumers, firms, and industries and the distribution of total production and income among them. It considers individuals both as suppliers of land, labour, and capital and as the ultimate consumers of the final product, and it examines firms both as suppliers of products and as consumers of labour and capital. Microeconomics seeks to analyze the market or other mechanisms that establish relative prices among goods and services and allocate society's resources among their many possible uses." Fast food chains can benefit from lower beef prices by purchasing large quantities of beef. Other companies who are package food producers cannot pass high prices completely over to consumers. Drought season decreases hay and grazing production causing meat prices to rocket.

Change in supply

Factors that lead to a change in supply are the availability of resources. The Law of Supply usually means "if demand is held constant, an increase in supply leads to a decreased price, while a decrease in supply leads to an increased price" InvestorWords.com (2010). Resources such as oil, corn, ethanol, and soybeans are factors in supply that cause change. Rising oil prices increase meat production prices and the demand of ethanol. Feedstuffs promote a potential boost to