The trend of alternatives to dairy has gotten hard to ignore. In most major U.S. cities, cafes will offer a range of different plant-based "milk" such as soya, almond and oat. In fact, the move to embrace such products has caused major disruption in the dairy industry, contributing to a huge decline in U.S. milk consumption in recent years. Many people are ditching milk and trying other options for a range of reasons, whether it's for animal welfare or health-related.

Considering how the trend seems to be getting more noticeable, which alternatives to dairy are proving the most popular? The most recent research into the situation was conducted by Nielsen last year and they found that almond milk is the biggest thorn in the side of the dairy industry. As of July 2018, annual sales of almond milk came to $1.2 billion, a 10 percent year-over-year unit increase. That's a long distance ahead of soy milk's sales which were worth $230 million. Newer entrants to the market like blends and oat milk are recording steady growth and are worth watching. In July of last year, they recorded unit growth of 47.8 and 13.2 percent respectively.