IRI has released its Summer Report*, revealing solid growth in Grocery, despite costs continuing to escalate in New Zealand.
Petrol prices and mortgage rates continued to rise, reducing household cashflows, eroding purchasing power and leading to a new low in consumer confidence (which fell to 81.7 in February).
Strained supply chains and inventory shortages have disrupted FMCG product supply and demand, which was evident in the out-of-stocks seen on grocery shelves across the country.
However, electronic card spend did improve this Summer, driven by a better December and January trading period.
Grocery performance
Summer is the most important season of the year, accounting for 26.6% of yearly sales. The latest IRI Summer Report revealed that value and unit growth outpaced Summer 2021 performance. This solid result was driven by a cracker Christmas and, more recently, Omicron-related sales.
The lower North Island region led the growth, outperforming all other regions and over-indexed in its contribution to national growth versus its contribution to national sales.
The hot summer weather boosted seasonal category sales, such as carbonated beverages, water, ice cream and insecticides, which all picked up share over the summer compared to the MAT period. Carbonated beverages’ summer growth outpaced last year in both value and units.
Shoppers are also buying larger pack formats and multipacks saw significant double-digit growth across value, units and volume.
The water category made a big splash this summer, with double digit growth across value, units and volume – a turnaround from last year’s decline. The weather played a major role, with a correlation between warmer temperatures and still water sales.
Ice Cream saw accelerated growth on last summer with Dollar sales expanding by an additional 10.5%. The key driver of growth in the ice cream category were Multipacks, which make up more than 50% of category sales (53.1%), generating an additional $6.4m of sales this year.
Multipack growth came from both premium and ice block ranges, which both saw significant double-digit growth across all measures. New product launches also play a vital role in category performance, with product innovation driving value and increased consumer interest.
Within multipacks alone, NPD generated $4.4m in sales over the summer period with Tip Top’s ‘Fruju Mango’ taking the number one NPD spot (based on dollar sales per week).
Insecticides also enjoyed a bumper summer of sales, with more than 24% growth on last year across value and units.
Source: IRI MarketEdge Grocery, New Zealand
*Based on Summer data – 13wks to 27/02/22
