Birds Eye has extended its Chicken Shop range with a popcorn chicken variant as it continues its push to bring foodservice-style products into the home.

The frozen giant’s new Texas Style BBQ Popcorn Chicken is set to hit Tesco stores from 6 September with a further listing in Morrisons confirmed for 13 September (rsp: £3/325g).

It has been made using 100% chicken breast and comes in barbecue flavour after a survey by Omnibus in November 2020 found it was popular among shoppers.

The NPD was said by Birds Eye to be ideal for sharing occasions and would fill a perceived consumer need for restaurant and takeaway-inspired meals in frozen aisles.

“Consumers still want, and will continue to want, restaurant-inspired meals from the comfort of their own homes,” claimed Birds Eye marketing manager Annalisa Fanali.

“The Birds Eye Chicken Shop range has proven to be a very popular way to meet that demand, bringing plus-78% incremental value sales to the category [Kantar 52 w/e 24 January 2021],” she said. “With such strong performance, it’s the perfect time to build our range and keep consumer attention focused on the Chicken Shop lineup with a new addition.”

Launched in 2018 to bring high street chicken shop-style food to in-home occasions, the range has also performed strongly in H1 this year.

The sub-brand’s sales have risen 29% from £11m [Nielsen 52 w/e 26 December 2020] to £15.6m [Nielsen 52 w/e 17 July 2021].

It comes after the release of new research by Birds Eye on Wednesday (25 August), which found 40% of parents were considering the frozen food category more actively than they were before the Covid-19 pandemic hit the UK in 2020.

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