How is the Family Meal Movement Doing?

Oct 22, 20253 min read

The 2025 survey results about National Family Meals Month indicate increased awareness and positive behavioral changes related to family meals across the U.S. population.

By: David Fikes, Executive Director, FMI Foundation

People eating together How are you doing? Those words are such a common greeting because we are all innately curious about our own and each other’s status. Over the ages we’ve developed thousands of ways of seeking answers to it. From grades on tests to mark academic progress to physical exams to measure strength and endurance. From competitions with scores to track wins and losses to endless ways to gauge work performance. It is a fundamental human yearning to want to know how we’re doing.

For eleven years the FMI Foundation has hosted Family Meals Month in September and each year our research partner, Harris Poll, surveys the American public to help us answer the question “how are we doing” at promoting family meals. Their polling helps gauge how widely we’ve communicated AND also how effective the messaging was. Our 2025 results were quite encouraging.

Let’s start by looking at the reach of National Family Meals Month messaging.

This year 34% of respondents reported seeing a National Family Meals Month promotion during the month of September. That is up from the 31% reported for the last three years and it means more than one-third of the USA, approximately 110 million people saw, heard, or experienced a family meals message. Our penetration numbers are even better among American households that have kids below the age of 18 in them. In that demographic, 52% reported witnessing a family meals promotion.

While those numbers reflect a substantial reach to the eyes and ears of the American public, the more gratifying metrics are those demonstrating the messages impact on the hearts, minds, and behaviors of those exposed to our campaign.

Of the 34% who heard the message, 94% reported taking positive action including one (or more) of the following:

42% - ate together more often.
44% - cooked more meals at home.
40% - made healthier food choices.
36% - purchased more fresh fruits and vegetables.

But again, the numbers are even better among the 52% of households with kids under 18, who heard our encouragement to have more family meals together. Among this group, an overwhelming 97% took our words to heart in at least one of the following ways:

52% - ate together more often.
47% - cooked more meals at home.
46% made healthier food choices.
41% purchased more fresh fruits and vegetables.

This year, one of our new messaging innovations was to offer Table Talk Placemats for our members to share with their customers. These 2-sided placemats bear conversation starters for those sharing a meal together to also deepen connections through meaningful conversation. We plan to keep this going by each month, throughout the next calendar year, offering a new Table Talk Placemat bearing a new set of questions or conversations prompts. These are available to our members to customize and distribute to their customers. They are also available for consumers to download directly.

Please help us keep the positive family meals energy growing throughout the year by encouraging those within your sphere of influence to enjoy more meals together and have thoughtful dialogue at every serving by using one of our placemats. It will give you something positive to say the next time someone asks “How are you doing?”

Grab Your Placemat