Top Food Stocks to Buy Now 2025 Update

Packaged food giant General Mills (GIS -0.39%) owns a wide variety of well-known brands. The company’s brand portfolio includes Pillsbury, Cheerios, Häagen-Dazs, Progresso, Green Giant, Yoplait, and many others. The latter upgrade will be well received by customers as Kura is both blessed and cursed with notoriously long wait times. In other attempts to reduce wait times and turnover speed, Kura Sushi has introduced tableside ordering and payment, as best food stocks well as robotic servers.

• Kellogg’s is one of the largest food manufacturing companies in the United States.
• To compile our list of the 11 best food stocks to buy according to Wall Street analysts, we looked for the largest food companies by market cap.
• The company is focusing on its diversified protein portfolio, including chicken, beef, and pork, to meet consumer demand.
• Target is a massive retailer that sells grocery products as well as clothing, home goods, entertainment, and more.
• Wall Street is noticing this company also because it is quietly riding all of these tailwinds—without the sky-high valuation.

Nomad Foods (NYSE:NOMD)

General Mills stock trades for around 12 times forward earnings, and it sports a dividend yield of roughly 4.9%, which has risen as share price performance has been tepid at best. There’s plenty of economic uncertainty right now, but General Mills’ pricing power should help see it through. The company reported strong results for Q with a 7.5% increase in sales and a 21% growth in adjusted EBITDA.

JBS is suitable for investors willing to tackle a lot of international risk and volatility in exchange for a very low valuation as measured by P/E and dividend yields. While it lacks the size and growth profile of KO, it shares a lot of similarities with Buffett’s favorite stock. The company has a history of successful brand launches or acquisitions and has proven to be a quality compounder. While the group takes its name from the famous Coca-Cola drink, it is now a massive corporation holding a very large array of 200 brands and the world’s largest nonalcoholic beverage company. It also owns a huge equity stake in another red-hot AI play, giving investors indirect exposure to multiple AI growth engines without paying a premium.

Thus, it is playing a significant role in helping companies overcome ongoing inflationary pressures. The ongoing inflationary impact is evident in the USDA Economic Research Service (ERS) May 2025 Food Price Outlook, where food prices are projected to grow by 2.9% in 2025. The two closest competitors are Barburrito (with 17 locations) and Chipotle (with 16 locations). Tortilla shows promise of attractive unit economics but has yet to reach the scale to boast operating leverage. They are the most well-resourced business of their kind in the UK with superior margins and supply chain operations. This may even be an attractive acquisition target given the fact it trades at £27.5 million compared to its expected 2024 gross profit of £50 million.

Best Food Stocks & ETFs

In 2009, Chipotle’s former Chief Development Office stated they “don’t have a timeline for when international will be meaningful to the business”. By 2018 it was just 37 and today they operate ~57; most of which are in Canada. Food is a very profitable sector, especially when supported by strong brands. Habits and marketing can make one person a lifetime consumer of this specific product.

Tyson Foods (NYSE: TSN)

In fact, it’s sitting on a war chest of cash—equal to nearly one-third of its entire market cap. While the world is distracted by flashy AI tickers, a few smart investors are quietly scooping up shares of the one company powering it all from behind the scenes. As the world chases faster, smarter machines, a hidden crisis is emerging behind the scenes.

The company is often referenced as a solid example of a stock with a strong moat in the form of a brand supported by multiple decades of marketing and product placement. Additionally, we mentioned the hedge fund sentiment surrounding each stock, which was taken from Insider Monkey’s Q database of 1,000 elite hedge funds. Now that we’ve briefly talked about the ongoing trade tensions, let’s take a look at the 11 best food stocks to buy according to Wall Street analysts. In this article, we’ll talk about the best food stocks on the market right now. U.S. consumers already derive the majority of their calories from plant-based sources, and the companies above offer plenty of plant-based options.

Best Food Stocks to Buy According to Wall Street Analysts

• Despite the challenges of the current economy, they were able to keep their prices stable, which drove revenue growth.
• Businesses are aggressively seeking to implement pricing optimization techniques, sustainability programs, and cutting-edge supply chain technologies to allay these worries and preserve profits.
• The “energize” segment saw a 6% CAGR since 2019, and the “stabilize” segment has been flat at 0%.
• This was also at the time when “new foods” were expected to take over the market by storm.
• Next, we focused on the top food stocks that analysts believe have the most potential for growth.

The best food companies have strong brands that compel consumers to pay up for their products, and they also enjoy economies of scale that keep costs low. Pricing power and cost advantages are particularly important now, with inflation squeezing budgets and supply chain costs rising. Chipotle is already a well-established brand, and because of their scale in their domestic territory, they already boast attractive, mature, margins. Gross margins of 40.9%, EBIT margins of 16.3%, and net income margins of 12.7% are industry-leading, and the company kicks off generous amounts of free cash flow too. While some feel Chipotle’s growth is saturated, we feel there are decades of room left to grow for this beloved brand. Chipotle is expected to report $11.35 billion in sales in 2024 (+15.02%), $12.88 billion in 2025 (+13.39%) and $14.68 billion by 2026 (+13.98%).

This isn’t just about making money – it’s about being part of the future. If you’re thinking about getting in, don’t wait – because once Wall Street catches wind of this story, the easy money will be gone. I’ve compiled everything you need to know about this groundbreaking company in a detailed, members-only report. In fact, Verge argues this company’s supercheap AI technology should concern rivals.

The company is eyeing 45,000 stores across the world in the coming years, most of which will come from China’s growth. Have you ever noticed that, whatever the market condition is, people never stop buying food and groceries. That’s why food stocks remain a resilient, income-generating investment even amid inflation or geopolitical turmoil. The global food market market—valued at $11.9 trillion in 2024 and set to hit $14.8 trillion by 2030—is one of the few sectors that keeps growing no matter the economy.

Taste, with various sauces, and convenience, with easy and quick-to-make meals. General Mills is another household name with 46 brands, including Cheerios, Cocoa Puff, Haagen Dazs, Old El Paso, and Yoplait, and even pet food with Blue Buffalo. The company has been hit by decreased meat consumption in the same way as Tyson Foods, but also by the generally negative outlook of markets about Brazil since President Lula’s election. It is the world’s largest beef producer, chicken producer, and second to largest pork producer. It is the leading producer of plant-based meat alternatives in Brazil and the third-largest in Europe. It’s also in first place for prepared meals in the UK, Australia, and New Zealand and second in Brazil.

Having been in business since 1939, Greggs has since become interwoven with the culture of Britain. Their low-cost offering and considerable gross margins have allowed them to survive recessions relatively unscathed. Those reinvestment opportunities provide investors with considerable optionality.

VanEck Future of Food ETF (YUMI)

Food stocks represent shares in companies involved in the food industry that are listed on stock exchanges, which allows the investing public to buy and sell ownership in them. The food industry’s long-term prospects are still bright despite these worries. Urbanization, the growth of the middle class, and shifting customer preferences all continue to help the industry.

Key Investment Insights for Kura Sushi (KRUS):

A significant contributor to the global economy, the food business has changed over time to meet shifting consumer needs, technological breakthroughs, and market conditions. The worldwide food and beverage industry was estimated to be worth $6.96 trillion in 2024 and is projected to grow to $7.4 trillion by 2025, according to The Business Research Company. Rapid urbanization, rising consumer spending, and a greater need for quick and healthful food options have all contributed to the industry’s growth. On the other side, businesses must contend with shifting trade regulations, supply chain limitations, and inflationary pressures. From this list, we picked companies with the highest upside potential as per analysts.

This membership model provides Costco with a steady source of income, which is very helpful during challenging economic times. This is reflected in their stock price, which has consistently improved over the last year. Starbucks is the world’s largest coffee chain, and they’re another restaurant that has adapted to the pandemic environment very well. They opened hundreds of new stores and were financially stable enough to launch a share buyback program. Many restaurant stocks struggled during the pandemic, but that wasn’t the case with Chipotle.