Coaxing Irish consumers back to Irish stores
While private label is increasingly gaining credence throughout Ireland, ShelfLife's discounter survey shows customers are still keen to buy brands within a pleasant environment.
Print18 March 2010
When the discounters arrived on these shores some ten years ago, Irish people were very reluctant to embrace the concept they presented. It took a while for the Irish snobbish attitude about private label food to dissipate.
As a nation we have always had a bit of a love affair with branded goods of the edible kind. Even when we go abroad on holidays we fill our cases with tea and crisps and the first thing we do when we get home is ask the Mammy to make us the Irish breakfast.
But while some of us were busy remortgaging our houses to take that much-needed shopping trip to Dubai, the savvy few were trying out the discounters and finding that they liked what they saw. As the economy went south, more consumers began looking at ways to save in every facet of their lives and suddenly non-branded goods were no longer deemed cheap and nasty. Quite the opposite actually. According to Nielsen, the discounters were the clear winners in the battle for market share in 2009, with their retail grocery market share growing from 9.6% to 11.8% by the end of 2009.
Ever since we’ve had to rethink our preferences for the finer things in life, it has become completely acceptable to haggle with your milkman, reuse your tea bags, proclaim to all who will listen that you are stony broke and of course shop in a discounter. ShelfLife carried out an online survey of 200 consumers this month to see what peoples’ attitudes are to discounter shopping.
It showed that 83% of respondents have shopped in a discounter and that the main draw is the special offers they advertise in non-food products. However nearly half of respondents say that they would still buy a branded product over a non-branded product if it were available. You can read the results of the survey in detail on page 18.
While Irish consumers are embracing value, our cousins across the pond in the US are regaining their taste for national brands. The Financial Times has reported that Kroger chief executive, David Dillon, said sales of Kroger’s private label goods surged during the recession but that national and private label brands grew at the same speed during its fourth quarter.
Whole Foods Market co-president, Walter Robb, said he had noticed a slowdown in private label goods sales and Steve Burd, chief executive of Safeway said the growth of private label foods may not be as strong as in previous quarters. This is an indication that things are improving in the US and what happens there will eventually trickle back here.
Although Irish consumers are fixated on value at present, our survey demonstrates that we still like to buy branded goods and shop in a pleasant environment; so through value and well-advertised special offers the multiples can coax back through their doors the shoppers they may have lost during the last few years.
Fionnuala Carolan
Editor
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