MIDWAY — The economic downturn has made food consumers a bit more frugal and more family-oriented than in the past.

That was part of the message from one of the featured speakers at Thursday's annual conference of the Utah Food Industry Association.

"They eat out, but they eat out less often and spend less when they do," Bill Manteria, vice president of the Washington, D.C.-based Food Marketing Institute, told the audience of about 200 people at the Zermatt Resort. "(Consumers) also eat out less and cook more at home ?— sometimes from scratch — while others seek food ready to eat or ready to heat."

Manteria said "the recession has brought families back home together."

He added that while consumers are trying to save money in tough economic times, retailers can use the situation as a way to "win back mealtime" by offering affordable, nutritious, better-tasting food that can be prepared in less time. And, he added, research conducted by his organization indicates that consumers consider food purchased at a supermarket to be more nutritious — "by a large margin."

"More than 90 percent of shoppers believe the food they prepare at home is healthier," he said.

Manteria suggested that grocery retailers focus more attention toward providing healthy, less-expensive food options as a way to remain competitive in the current economic environment.

As for the outlook for the food industry and the rest of the economy, one analyst at the conference said recovering from the historic recession is going to take some time.

"We still have a ways to go," Barry Asmus, senior economist for the National Center for Policy Analysis, told the Deseret News. "This next year will still be a drag."

Headquartered in Dallas, the center is a nonprofit, nonpartisan public policy research organization, according to its Web site.

Asmus said retailers and other businesses would likely continue to struggle through the end of 2010.

"This is a recession that probably lasts about a year, and the after-effects … maybe another year or so," he added.

Even though he expects many leading economic indicators will begin to recover in the next 12 months, he worries that job growth will continue to lag.

"We may continue to see 9 and 10 percent unemployment rates (nationally), which makes the retailing side weaker than it was in years prior," Asmus said.

Not good news for the members of his audience on Thursday. To combat the effects of the historic downturn, he urged retailers to "go back to basics" and focus on making consumer satisfaction their top priority.

That strategy, he said, will eventually pay big dividends as the recovery picks up and pushes the economy upward once again.

"Customer service is not a competitive edge," Asmus said. "It is the competitive edge."

e-mail: jlee@desnews.com