Cottage‑cheese protein boom
A new national brand, MULU, is launching with 18 grams of complete protein per half‑cup — about 33% more than the leading cottage‑cheese brand — signaling big commercial momentum for cottage cheese as a high‑protein staple. (perishablenews.com) Retail data cited by the report says U.S. cottage‑cheese sales are up roughly 20% year‑over‑year, and the hashtag #cottagecheese has surpassed half a billion views on TikTok, showing the trend has real consumer scale. (perishablenews.com)
Cottage cheese spent years as the quiet tub in the back of the dairy case, and now a brand-new national launch is treating it like a sports nutrition product. Dairy Farmers of America rolled out MULU at Walmart on April 8 with 18 grams of protein in a half-cup, sold in 16-ounce tubs for a suggested $4.26. (dfamilk.com) That 18-gram number is the whole pitch. Dairy Farmers of America says it is 33% more protein than the leading cottage-cheese brand, which puts the leader at roughly 13.5 grams per half-cup by comparison. (prnewswire.com) This is not a tiny startup testing one city. Dairy Farmers of America is a dairy cooperative owned by about 9,500 family farmers, and it launched MULU straight into Walmart stores nationwide instead of starting in a few regional chains. (dfamilk.com) The timing is not random either. Dairy Foods, citing Circana retail data for the 52 weeks ending February 23, said U.S. cottage-cheese dollar sales reached $1.75 billion, up 18% year over year, while unit sales rose 13% to 558 million. (dairyfoods.com) That sales jump follows an even longer run. Reporting on Circana data through June 15, outlets last year said U.S. retail cottage-cheese sales were up 20% year over year after roughly 17% annual gains in both 2024 and 2023 and an 11% increase in 2022. (ksl.com) Social video helped turn a spoon-and-pepper snack into an ingredient. TikTok’s Creative Center showed the hashtag #cottagecheese at about 3.87 billion views when crawled last month, and the tag page showed 107,500 posts, which is why blended dips, flatbreads, bowls, and desserts keep resurfacing in grocery demand. (ads.tiktok.com) (tiktok.com) The protein story is also changing the product itself. Traditional cottage cheese is mostly casein, a slower-digesting milk protein, while MULU says it uses a whey-and-casein formula so it can market both quick and sustained amino-acid delivery in the same half-cup serving. (dairyfoods.com) That is why the new tubs look less like a nostalgia play and more like a protein-bar fight happening in the refrigerated aisle. When a category grows to $1.75 billion, gets billions of TikTok views, and attracts a national Walmart launch built around one nutrition number, it has moved from fad to fixture. (dairyfoods.com) (ads.tiktok.com) (dfamilk.com)
