Compete Ranks Top 50 Food and Cooking Web Sites for December 2009

Boston MA, – (January 28, 2010) -- Compete, a Kantar Media company, today released its ranking of the top 50 food and cooking Web sites for December 2009. In addition to the typical seasonal traffic spike, the cooking and grocery sites categories have both sustained significant year-over-year growth. Traffic to recipe sites grew in 2009 as a number of the online outlets added mobile applications and new ways to interact with their brands. In addition, grocery store chains attempted to capitalize on the number of online shoppers by adding home delivery services, featured products and online deals.

40 Million Cooks in the Kitchen

Compete's cooking category, which includes 195 sites dedicated to cooking tips and recipes, saw steady growth throughout 2009. In December, 40.7 million aspiring chefs visited cooking sites in search of holiday recipes, representing a 13.2 percent increase in unique visitors (UVs) over December 2008. Allrecipes.com topped the list of most heavily trafficked cooking sites by attracting 16.12 million UVs in December, a 22.1 percent year-over-year increase. Cooks.com (11.38 million UVs) and Kraftfoods.com (5.71 million UVs) also saw traffic bolstered by holiday chefs, growing 14.37 percent and 10.26 percent month-over-month respectively.

Better than Fruitcake

December was also a high-traffic month in the food and grocery category, which includes food gifting sites, supermarkets and grocery delivery services. In December 2009, the category grew 21.65 percent month-over-month and attracted 8.52 percent more UVs than the same month in 2008. The most heavily trafficked food gifting sites in December included OmahaSteaks.com (4.5 million UVs), HaleGroves.com (2.83 million UVs) and PittmanDavis.com (1.1 million UVs).

Paper, Plastic or Delivery?

In 2009, grocery chains made strides to improve their Web experience, enticing shoppers to visit their online outlets with delivery options, coupons and deals, featured products and recipes. Publix Super Markets led the online grocery race in December with 1.39 million UVs; the site increased traffic 52.4 percent year-over-year. Although they experienced slight declines from November 2009, StopandShop.com (650,191 UVs) and Albertsons.com (633,202 UVs) also continued to garner significant online attention.

Defining Compete's Site Categories

Information regarding aggregate Web categories is drawn from the Compete PRO Enterprise edition on Compete.com. For more information on the enterprise offering, please contact aprebluda@compete.com.

About Compete
Compete, a Kantar Media company, helps the world's top brands improve their marketing based on the online behavior of millions of consumers. Leading marketers such as Carlson Hotels Worldwide, Hyundai Motor America, Upromise, Chrysler, and Verizon Wireless rely on Compete's services to create effective online experiences and highly profitable advertising campaigns. Compete's online behavior database—the largest in the industry—makes the Web as ingrained in marketing as it is in people's lives. Compete was founded in 2000 and is located in Boston, MA, with offices throughout the U.S. For more information about us, please visit www.competeinc.com/, or to join the conversation visit www.compete.com/.

About Kantar
Kantar is one of the world's largest insight, information and consultancy networks. By uniting the diverse talents of its 13 specialist companies, the group aims to become the pre-eminent provider of compelling and inspirational insights for the global business community. Its 26,500 employees work across 95 countries and across the whole spectrum of research and consultancy disciplines, enabling the group to offer clients business insights at each and every point of the consumer cycle. The group's services are employed by over half of the Fortune Top 500 companies. For further information, please visit us at www.kantar.com.