The Rise of Girl Dinner: Gen Z’s Response To Rising Food Prices or the New Face of Diet Culture?
The app of the decade—and the generation—is TikTok.
TikTok’s rise is in part credited to the COVID-19 pandemic and its resultant lockdown. In the first quarter of 2020, TikTok was downloaded more times than any other app in one given quarter according to Sensor Tower and according to Adulent, 60% of TikTok users are Gen Zs.
Simply put, many were forced to turn to their phone screens for entertainment which they found on TikTok. TikTok quickly became a cultural phenomenon and one of the only from the pandemic with staying power. It spawned a slew of cultural moments, phrases, and catapulted a few stars to mainstream fame with examples like Addison Rae who starred in the Netflix original film, He’s All That , a gender-swapped remake of the 1999 film ‘She's All That’. She is also slated to appear in the movie ‘Thanksgiving’ later this year and ‘Animal Friend’ next year all while drawing comparison to Britney Spears by Vogue.
Today, TikTok is in many ways ‘that girl’. The promotional efforts of many projects are thought about through ‘can this go viral on Tiktok?’ In fact, not thinking about TikTok virality is considered going against the grain.
Where in the past many trends of TikTok were linked or tied to songs—the silhouette challenge of 2021 was linked to a mashup of Put Your Hand On My Shoulders by Paul Anka and Streets by Doja Cat. The biggest trend from this year on TikTok is rooted in food and is currently in the middle of a discourse on whether it is response to rising food prices, promoting diet culture or just plain fun. The TikTok is generally credited to have been started by Olivia Maher. However, if you search on TikTok, the original sound is credited to Karma Carr, whose video has over 19.1 million views as at the time of reporting—the Top Liked video however is Grace Maria’s whose video has 19.2 million views—a staggering 38 million views shared across just those two videos.
With such viral popularity, one can understand why so many are concerned about the possibility of girl dinner promoting diet culture and the long term dangers of this. "Over a prolonged period of time, crash dieting or heavily restricting your calorie intake may cause your metabolism to slow down. This will mean you burn less energy and consequently it can become more challenging to lose weight. You’re also more likely to start breaking down muscle mass rather than fat mass," explains registered nutritionist Jenna Hope when speaking to Cosmopolitan.
“Girl dinner has become such a big trend that there is no set ‘standard’ on what is or is not a girl dinner, and because of that, it’s hard to comment on the nutritional value because it may look like a snack plate or a charcuterie board, but it may also just be a bowl of noodles or chips,” says Laura Ligos, a registered dietitian nutritionist tells Canvas8. “While I think there can be healthy and filling girl dinner options, there are many that are not really what I would consider to be a meal as they lack either enough calories or enough of a certain macro (i.e. protein, fat, carbs).” she says.
On the other side of the coin, we wonder whether girl dinner is possibly also this generation’s response to increasing poverty levels paired with a rise in food prices as a way of putting lipstick on a pig. In the United States, food prices have spiked by 11.4%, the largest annual increase since May 1979, according to data released in mid-September by the Bureau of Labor Statistics while grocery prices jumped 13.5% and restaurant menu prices increased 8% in that period.
The result? That same year, US snack sales reached $181 billion, up by 11% from the previous year according to this research done by Wunderman Thompson titled ‘Snackification’. Between 2018 and 2022, sales of salty snacks grew by 42% to $35.3 billion, according to Circana. In Africa, a similar story seems to be playing out. Staple food prices in sub-Saharan Africa surged by an average of 23.9% in 2020-22—the most since the 2008 global financial crisis according to the IMF and, much like the West, this is showing up in snacks sales, expected to grow annually by 10.23% between 2023 and 2028 according to Statista.
Research company Mintel shared in their March 2023 report that Gen Z is the ‘super snacking generation’ noting that their research shows that a quarter of Gen Z snacks more than once a day. Nearly half (49%) eat snacks to boost their moods while 30% agree they are a convenient meal replacement. Mintel also projects that the snacking sector in the country will grow by over 7% between 2022 and 2026, with Gen Z consumers being the primary drivers of this growth.
With Gen Z crowned ‘the super snacking generation’, it’s become clear how Gen Z trends like girl dinner are accelerating the growth of the snack industry. However, when paired with Gen Z’s concern over political correctness, diet culture, and general wellness, snack brands will need to pay special attention to offering healthier, ethically produced versions of these snacks to ensure long-term appeal to a global consumer base that’s quickly becoming Gen Z-dominant.
