Kelly Anne Celli, a Lincoln Park Zoo employee who moonlights as a real estate agent, compares herself to a giraffe because she's always munching, slowly but surely. On something.
She never sits for meals; she doesn't even have a kitchen table.
But while the tradition of sitting down for three square meals has long been fading, major food companies whose profits depend on how much and how often we eat have found that snacking is replacing meals for a growing number of people. And those who do eat a few meals a day are snacking more between meals too.
"Half the time when people are eating, they're eating snacks," said Harvey Hartman, founder and chairman of The Hartman Group, a market research firm based in Bellevue, Wash. Just 10 percent of people stick to a breakfast-lunch-dinner meal pattern. And about 6 percent don't eat any meals at all, instead opting to "graze."
"I eat from the moment I get up until I go to bed," said Celli, a 27-year-old who bounds with energy and whose husband is more of a traditional eater. During "dinner," she said, he eats "massive portions" compared to what she consumes because she's nibbled all day. "I'm not overweight," she said. "I ran the marathon last year."
Celli, who's been eating this way as long as she can remember, made a conscious effort to eat more healthfully four years ago by adding more fruits, vegetables and whole grains to her diet. This mirrors one trend food companies emphasized at a consumer products conference in Florida last week: Not only are people snacking more, but they're chomping on healthier stuff.
"They need to get more out of the snacking moment than what they used to. So mindless munching, or just kind of hollow calories, is really not where consumers are going," said Mark Clouse, president of the North America business at Deerfield-based Mondelez International, which makes snacks including Oreos and Triscuits.
"Traditional meals, in the way we know them, are shrinking as a behavior," Clouse said. "The reality is that what a snack used to be, or what a snack is versus a smaller meal, those lines get very blurry."
All considered: What's the difference between six small meals a day and continuously snacking?
"I would say the difference is time," said Peter Herrnreiter, who shops for prepared foods like packaged sugar snap peas at Trader Joe's and eats five or six small meals a day. He describes those meals as sort of a hybrid between a snack and a meal. The 28-year-old Chicago marketing professional said he exercises consistently and likes to eat every two to three hours to keep his energy up and his metabolism pumping.
Companies are responding to the "small meals" concept. This year, Chicago-based Hillshire Brands Co. will introduce a product line called Hillshire Snacking, with higher-end "small plates" such as Italian dry salami, Gouda cheese and crackers packaged together.
Other than health, the most common reason people choose to snack is that they don't have time to prepare meals.
"I don't always get to take a full lunch break," said Schaumburg resident Amanda Talar, who works for an oral surgeon and thinks grazing can be healthier and more convenient. "I'm pretty busy. I don't always get to step away from a desk."
For time-pressed consumers, companies such as PepsiCo still sell plenty of Fritos and Cheetos.
And companies such as Mondelez see a chance to reap bigger profits from on-the-go foods. The snack industry has grown 5 to 6 percent each year for the last three years and is worth $1.2 trillion worldwide today, with packaged snacks accounting for about half of that, according to Mondelez Chairman and Chief Executive Irene Rosenfeld.
People often buy snacks to eat immediately, when they are typically not as focused on price. More than 80 percent of snack decisions are made where people buy their food, which is just fine with Mondelez.
"We like immediate consumption because we like the margins," Rosenfeld said in an interview.
Cereal-maker Kellogg said there are as many as four occasions when people eat between waking up and having lunch.
Michael Allen, president of the U.S. Morning Foods division at Kellogg Co., said that on average, people eat about 1.7 times and consume an average of 3.4 items in the morning. Someone might have a "pre-breakfast" cup of coffee or tea, or eat while sitting or getting ready for work or school. That person might then grab something in transit and eat it then or later, or have a midmorning snack at work or school.
Lauren Hise, a 24-year-old social media manager in Evanston, typically has a snack between breakfast and lunch.
"The thing with snacking is, I love to eat, I love food," Hise said. "And I'm downright cranky when I'm hungry."
She tries to eat three moderately sized meals each day and snacks in between to keep her metabolism up. She said it helps prevent her from overeating at mealtimes.
But the snacks she chooses, she said, are almost always natural; kiwi and raw walnuts are among her favorites.
"There are so many snack foods now claiming to be healthy, but you really have to do your research," Hise said. "Nothing's going to benefit your body like whole foods, fruit and veggies. Is the 100-calorie pack of Cheez-Its really going to make me think I cheated, or is it just a poor substitute?"
Sara Ordonez, a 23-year-old business student at Harold Washington College, said she often stops by the flagship Walgreen store on North State Street between classes. She's particularly fond of the new blueberry BelVita biscuits. She also likes Nature Valley bars and all kinds of nuts. She said she snacks to keep her energized for class and less ravenous when she gets home for dinner at 7:30 or 8 p.m.
To be sure, not everyone snacks. Take Kyle Thoms, a 29-year-old Chicagoan in sales, who said he eats three meals a day because he's afraid that if he ate constantly, he would end up overeating or eating unhealthful foods. Chips in particular, he said, are his weakness.
"I was a three-meals-a-day person until I went to college, and then it was a free-for-all," Thoms recalled. "I ate whatever I wanted. ... And I've always been a skinny guy, so what I ate didn't really affect me."
Now, Thoms does much of his meal preparing on Sundays and limits himself to three meals a day. He even prepares bacon and eggs, which he reheats for breakfast during the week.
"I think society just makes it so easy to not eat three square meals a day," Thoms said. "Even if it doesn't really take an effort, society makes you think it does take a lot of effort."
Then there's Beck Anstee, 42, of Chicago, a single mom attending grad school at DePaul to become a nurse while working part time and raising two daughters, ages 10 and 7. Mealtime, she said, is a priority for both her children and herself because she follows a Paleo diet, which is based on eating natural foods.
"It just takes a lot for planning," Anstee said of her three meals a day. "I had to make it a ritual to plan meals and to pack mine ahead of time."
Although she rarely snacks, she said her children do after school. To accommodate them, she tries to keep organic fruits and cheese on hand and, as a result, apparently is part of yet another trend.
Companies such as Denver-based WhiteWave Foods Co. are breaking into the children's snack food market with items such as graham crackers made with organic wheat and organic cracker sandwiches.
Meanwhile, Mondelez, the company known for Oreo cookies, is putting more emphasis on the better-for-you foods it sells, such as Triscuit crackers and BelVita breakfast biscuits. Such "fuel" foods make up just 25 percent of its portfolio, while "treats" account for 60 percent.
"We've significantly increased our spending behind some of these better-for-you products like Triscuit, like Wheat Thins," Rosenfeld said, "because we're seeing that's where the consumer is going as well."
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