8 Category Trends to Drive Away the Economic Blues

The festive season gave us a much-needed sales boost. Yay for that! 

So how did the categories perform in the month of October? We looked at the throughput from kirana stores to analyse the trends. Here’s a quick look at it. If you need more information, please look up the latest edition of our monthly kirana report. Download the sample report here.

GAINING CATEGORIES

Consumer Durables: Consumer Durables have seen the highest growth in kiranas across all categories. Category sales are 202.7% higher than Jan-20.

Confectionery: Confectionery has seen the second-highest growth in kiranas across all categories. Category sales are 41.4% higher than Jan-20 & growing for the fifth month in a row. 

Commodity: The commodity has seen almost a 13.9% increase in sales, driven by higher stocking at the outlet. This is despite fewer kiranas stocking the products in Oct-20 vs Jan-20 (-1.1%).

Beverages: Beverages had a relatively muted 7.4% increase in sales vs Jan-20 due to increased stocking at kiranas in expectation of October heat-driving consumption. 

RECOVERING CATEGORIES

Personal Care: This category has shown the best recovery MoM. From being the worst affected category during the lockdown, it’s now made a handsome recovery and is just 1% lower in sales in Oct-20 compared to Jan-20 levels.

Home Care: In Oct-20, the stocking of Homecare products continued its upward movement. It does seem that an increasing number of kiranas are stocking these products in keeping with their customers’ pressing need to stay safe and hygienic given the virus worries. It remains the most distributed category in a month yet again. 

IMPACTED CATEGORIES

Dairy: This category remains under pressure with consumption down by 23.2% in Oct-20 (-17% in Sep-20) when compared to pre-lockdown levels of Jan-20. 

Packaged Foods: This remains the worst affected category even post-lockdown. While increased IPL viewership has improved sales MoM by 28%, we still see the sales of Packaged Foods in Oct-20 are lower than Jan-20 by 41.9%. 

Every month, we release a kirana report that describes the kirana activity in the country. While at it, we also look into the health of the various categories. 

Given that we’re entering the festival months, we have also added insights on how kiranas perform during these days. We’ve tracked Gandhi Jayanti (2nd Oct) and the Navratri period through to Dussehra. 

For many categories, the month-end stock push to kiranas is a key part of their sales playbook. In this edition, we look deeper to see if this is a really helpful activity or if is it just a zero-sum game. Download the sample report here.

For the full report, write to us at marketing@mobisy.com.

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