Greece’s economy may be hurting, but Greek yogurt is booming.
Over the past five years, the thicker brand of yogurt has increasingly dominated supermarket dairy cases, in some instances expanding the size of those cases as shoppers have to choose between Dannon Oikos, Chobani Flip and Chobani Indulgent — and a whole lot more.
“For nearly a decade, Greek and Greek-style yogurt has been the driving force behind growth in the yogurt and yogurt drink market in the U.S.,” the food market research firm Packaged Facts reported earlier this year. “Today, Greek yogurt commands a 50 percent share of the yogurt market in this country, a remarkable rise since 2007, when the products were a niche category within the overall market. Today consumers are hard-pressed to find traditional yogurt products on supermarket shelves.”
Much of the Greek yogurt craze is traced back to Hamdi Ulukaya, a Turkish cheese maker in New York state who at 34 seized the opportunity in 2005 to buy an old Kraft yogurt and cheese factory in central New York and tried to popularize the thick yogurt he recalled his father making back home. He named his product Chobani, based on the Turkish word for shepherd.
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