You know you're in silly season when the national press deems newsworthy stories about a) Casper the cat's predilection for taking buses, b) the death of Benson, Britain's best loved carp, and c) consumers trading down from brands to own label.
The last one's not silly, I hear you say. Oh, but it is. Aside from the fact the uSwitch.com data on which it's based was collated from the responses of a few thousand of the website's users (hardly a representative sample), uSwitch extrapolated from said data that 31m more people bought own label this April than last August. Yes, that's right: 31m MORE. Just how many shopping adults are there in the UK that 31m MORE can suddenly hit the shops in a single month? Plus, why compare this April (when Easter fell) with last August (at the height of the summer when many of us were on holiday)?
As an insight into current shopping behaviour, it's about as compelling as an interview with Jordan. Even the top line that people are trading down to own label is specious. The inference is the uplift in own label correlates neatly with a fall in sales of branded goods. Premier Foods and Unilever would beg to differ. The bigger problem, however, is that the data implies that the whole own-label category is doing well particularly the budget ranges. That just isn't the case, as our lead story this week reveals. Budget own-label growth has slowed dramatically, while premium own label has resumed a path of steady growth, having been in decline for a year.
Indeed, people seem to be trading up from budget not down to it. Fears relating to job security are subsiding. Many people have more disposable income than they did before the recession why not splash out on Tesco Finest rather than Value? And with the price differential between premium own label and brands marginal, the brands could also be benefiting. It's budget own label that's in danger of being left on the shelf.
The last one's not silly, I hear you say. Oh, but it is. Aside from the fact the uSwitch.com data on which it's based was collated from the responses of a few thousand of the website's users (hardly a representative sample), uSwitch extrapolated from said data that 31m more people bought own label this April than last August. Yes, that's right: 31m MORE. Just how many shopping adults are there in the UK that 31m MORE can suddenly hit the shops in a single month? Plus, why compare this April (when Easter fell) with last August (at the height of the summer when many of us were on holiday)?
As an insight into current shopping behaviour, it's about as compelling as an interview with Jordan. Even the top line that people are trading down to own label is specious. The inference is the uplift in own label correlates neatly with a fall in sales of branded goods. Premier Foods and Unilever would beg to differ. The bigger problem, however, is that the data implies that the whole own-label category is doing well particularly the budget ranges. That just isn't the case, as our lead story this week reveals. Budget own-label growth has slowed dramatically, while premium own label has resumed a path of steady growth, having been in decline for a year.
Indeed, people seem to be trading up from budget not down to it. Fears relating to job security are subsiding. Many people have more disposable income than they did before the recession why not splash out on Tesco Finest rather than Value? And with the price differential between premium own label and brands marginal, the brands could also be benefiting. It's budget own label that's in danger of being left on the shelf.
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