Case Study
Face-to-Face Consumer Interviews For Havering Council
On the face of it, all is quiet on the promotional fixtures front – but there are plenty of changes happening below the surface. While the total number of promotions – and the brands doing the most – has been fairly stable in the four weeks to 23 February compared with a month and even a year ago, how they are promoting is altering.
The straight money-off deal is becoming increasingly popular with suppliers and retailers – and shoppers, suggests Kay Staniland, MD at retail analysts Assosia. “The basic ‘price cut/save’ is favoured by most as consumers can see the difference in price – nothing hidden, no x-for-y deals to work out, just a straight forward money-off.”
Of the 10 most-promoted brands, six have increased their use of the ‘save’ mechanic year-on-year. In the past four weeks, over half of Cadbury’s deals in the big five were straight money-off compared with just a quarter a year ago. Mars, Birds Eye and Fox’s have each ramped up use of the mechanic to around 70% of their featured space promotions this month. On average, ‘save’ deals account for 43.5% of all featured space in-store, up 6.3 points on last year.
Meanwhile, the industry is shifting away from the potentially more expensive half-price offer, with eight of the top 10 running fewer such deals. This was particularly true of Birds Eye, which slashed its use of half-price from 42% of deals a year ago to just 22%. On average, half-price now accounts for about 18% of all featured space in-store.
One brand that bucked the trends was Hardys, which offered three times as many featured space deals as a year ago, and proportionally less use of ‘save’. The surge in activity follows a brand revamp late last year supported by a £2.6m push that runs through to April.
But Hardys is an exception, with the rest of the big players generally running similar levels of activity to the previous periods, though Coca-Cola and Walkers are running considerably more deals than a year ago.
“Featured space is an expensive proposition for most companies, but the big players still consider the investment worthwhile,” said Staniland.
| 4 weeks to 23/02/2014 | ||||||||
| Ranking | Rank last month | Brand | Number of promotions | Increase / Decrease on previous month | Increase / Decrease on previous year | Average % saving | Average savings % change m-o-m | Average savings % change y-o-y |
| 1 | 1 | Cadbury | 327 | -0.30% | -13.95% | 34.80% | 0.0% | 4.7% |
| 2 | 2 | Birds Eye | 200 | -8.68% | -0.50% | 36.86% | 1.3% | -4.5% |
| 3 | 4 | McVitie’s | 191 | 2.14% | -2.05% | 33.97% | 0.3% | -2.1% |
| 4 | 3 | Coca-Cola | 188 | -5.05% | 41.35% | 32.76% | 1.8% | 2.7% |
| 5 | 5 | Nestle | 183 | 2.23% | 0.55% | 35.53% | 0.2% | -1.7% |
| 6 | 6 | Mars | 146 | -4.58% | -2.01% | 37.14% | -1.2% | 3.0% |
| 7 | 7 | Walkers | 136 | -9.93% | 32.04% | 37.11% | 2.3% | -2.3% |
| 8 | 8 | Kellogg’s | 104 | 4.00% | -30.20% | 41.53% | 0.0% | 6.0% |
| 9 | 9 | Hardy’s | 103 | 6.19% | 202.94% | 39.83% | 0.1% | -1.9% |
| 10 | 12 | Fox’s | 88 | 8.64% | 2.33% | 37.43% | -2.7% | 0.5% |
| Total o/l | 2040 | 1.64% | 0.84% | 27.26% | 0.1% | -0.8% | ||
| Total brands | 8939 | -1.01% | 4.55% | 33.52% | 0.2% | -0.7% | ||
| Total | 10979 | -0.53% | 3.84% | 32.36% | 0.2% | -0.6% |
Published in The Grocer, 07 March 2014