Frozen food’s growing role in Canada’s food system

Frozen food is playing a larger role in Canadian grocery baskets. This blog examines why frozen food is gaining momentum in Canada, how it is changing consumer behaviour and supply chains, and why it could play a growing role in strengthening Canada's food system.

Demand for frozen food has soared

Not long ago, the frozen aisle was associated mainly with basic vegetables, pizzas and a narrow selection of convenience meals. Today, consumers can choose from frozen fruits and vegetables, seafood, bakery products, ready-to-cook ingredients and restaurant-inspired meals. Freezing is no longer only a preservation method; it has become part of product innovation and value creation.

Advances such as individually quick frozen (IQF) technology better preserve taste, texture and nutritional quality. Processors have also moved beyond single-ingredient products, adding seasoning, portioning, meal assembly and specialized packaging to create higher-value foods.

This transformation is reflected in sales. Between 2019 and 2025, frozen food retail sales increased by 63%, substantially outpacing the 39% growth recorded for fresh food (Figure 1). This suggests that frozen food is no longer simply an alternative to fresh food. It has become a distinct category that creates new opportunities for processors while offering consumers greater choice, convenience and quality. Growth has not been limited to the domestic market. Between 2020 and 2025, Canadian exports of frozen fruits increased by 14% in volume, while frozen vegetable exports increased by 38%, highlighting growing opportunities for Canadian products beyond Canada’s borders.

Figure 1: Frozen food retail sales have grown faster than fresh food sales since 2019

Sources: Statistics Canada, FCC Economics

What’s behind the change in consumer habits?

Frozen food helps households manage four increasingly valuable resources: time, money, food, and flexibility. This combination of benefits helps explain why demand has continued to grow even as grocery prices have risen.

Affordability is part of frozen food's appeal, although not necessarily because frozen products cost less. Between 2016 and 2025, frozen fruit prices increased just 8%, compared with 23% for fresh fruit, a 15-percentage-point difference (Figure 2). The gap was much smaller for vegetables. For some products, frozen options can also be less expensive than their fresh counterparts. Retail price data for strawberries, for example, show that frozen strawberries are generally less expensive than fresh strawberries outside Canada’s main production season. At the same time, frozen products can be stored for months and used as needed, allowing households to reduce spoilage, buy in larger quantities when prices are attractive and better manage grocery budgets.

Figure 2: Prices for frozen fruits and vegetables have generally risen more slowly than for fresh products

Sources: Statistics Canada, FCC Economics

Frozen food also fits the way Canadians now plan and prepare meals. Busy households increasingly look for products that simplify meal preparation, keep ingredients readily available and reduce the need for frequent grocery shopping. The ability to portion foods, store them for longer periods and use only what is needed provides greater flexibility while helping reduce household food waste. Meanwhile, manufacturers have responded by expanding healthier product offerings and improving nutritional quality, reinforcing consumer confidence in the category.

Consumer spending reflects this broad-based shift. Between 2019 and 2023, average household expenditures increased across nearly every frozen food category, including frozen meat preparations (+26%), frozen potato products (+77%), frozen dinners (+21%) and frozen fish portions (+50%) (Table 1). Rather than being driven by one or two products, frozen food has become more deeply integrated into everyday eating habits.

Table 1: Average expenditure per household for selected frozen food categories (dollars)

Sources: Statistics Canada, FCC Economics

Frozen and fresh foods increasingly complement one another, with frozen products offering households greater flexibility, longer storage and less waste. Meeting that demand, however, requires infrastructure that extends well beyond the freezer aisle.

Beyond the freezer aisle: Building a stronger food system

Growing demand for frozen food highlights the importance of Canada's cold chain: the network of processors, refrigerated warehouses, transportation providers and distribution centres that preserve product quality from processing plants to consumers.

Reported refrigerated storage capacity among three major Canadian operators increased by approximately 29% between 2018 and 2025, from 145 million to 187 million cubic feet, with nearly two-thirds of that expansion occurring after 2023¹. Although these operators do not represent the entire industry, the trend points to continued investment in Canada's refrigerated warehousing network. Investment is not only about adding space. Automation, robotics, digital inventory management and more energy-efficient refrigeration systems are also improving productivity, reducing operating costs and helping processors respond more effectively to changing demand.

For Canadian agriculture and food manufacturing, these investments matter. A stronger cold chain can help processors spread seasonal production over longer periods, reduce pressure to market products immediately after harvest and connect Canadian farms with consumers throughout the year.

Turning seasonal production into year-round supply

Canada's climate concentrates the harvest of many fruits and vegetables into a relatively short growing season, even though demand exists year-round. Traditionally, this gap has been addressed through winter imports and the rapid marketing of domestic production after harvest. Expanding freezing capacity offers another approach by preserving products at peak quality and distributing them gradually throughout the year.

To illustrate the scale of this opportunity, we used Environment and Climate Change Canada’s estimate that 13% of fruits and vegetables grown in Canada go unharvested or are discarded following harvest. We applied that to Statistics Canada production data for selected crops and compared the estimated losses with Canadian import volumes. The results show that those losses are significant.

Table 2: Estimated harvest losses are equivalent to a meaningful share of imports for selected crops (2025)

Estimated harvest losses are equivalent to 66% of pea imports, 55% of corn imports and 24% of blueberry imports, compared with less than 10% for strawberries and broccoli. This does not mean these imports could be displaced directly: not all losses are recoverable or suitable for freezing, and imports remain important for year-round availability. But the comparison illustrates the potential for processing and preservation to capture more value from food Canada already produces.

The opportunity also extends beyond reducing losses or imports. Additional processing, packaging, storage and distribution create economic activity throughout Canada's food manufacturing and logistics sectors and allow Canadian agricultural products to be marketed over longer periods. Growing exports of frozen fruits and vegetables also suggest that these investments could create opportunities beyond the domestic market, helping Canadian producers and processors expand exports and potentially reach new markets.

Bottom line

Frozen food will not replace fresh food or eliminate imports. But it can help Canada make better use of what it already grows, extend domestic market windows and strengthen food-system resilience.

From the consumer’s standpoint, frozen food is no longer simply about convenience. It reflects how households manage time, affordability and food waste. The corresponding increase in demand presents opportunities.

For producers and processors, stronger frozen food demand can create additional outlets for seasonal production, support value-added processing and reduce some perishability risks. Cold-chain operators also stand to benefit from continued demand for storage, logistics, automation and energy-efficient refrigeration.

The ramp-up in consumer demand for frozen foods can also help policymakers as they implement Canada’s National Food Security Strategy. This shift in consumer behaviour arguably makes investment more viable along the supply chain e.g. processing, storage, logistics. As such, there are opportunities for government to work with industry to ensure food security and supply-chain resilience for years to come.

¹ GCCA/IARW Top 25 membership data; FCC Economics calculations

Ulrich Zombre

Senior Economist

Ulrich leads development of the FCC Food and Beverage Report and delivers a range of analyses tailored to the evolving needs of the sector. With more than 15 years of career experience, he’s worked in areas such as food and beverage, fruit and vegetable production, and value chains.

Before joining FCC in 2026, Ulrich worked at Natural Resources Canada and the Quebec Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, where he led research on the food processing sector. He also served as a public policy consultant to the World Bank. Ulrich holds a PhD in economics from L’Institut Agro Montpellier.

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