The furore about Mars’ plans to slap ‘health warnings’ on some of its cooking sauces has not deterred shoppers from its Dolmio brand, suggests data from MySupermarket.
Year-on-year sales of Dolmio through the online retail platform increased after 18 April, when Mars attracted widespread media coverage for announcing that some of its lines would be labelled as unsuitable for daily consumption. These include high-fat products such as Dolmio pesto, which will be labelled to warn shoppers they should be enjoyed no more than once a week.
Between 14 April and 1 May, 35% of pasta shoppers put a Dolmio sauce in their basket, compared with 28% in the same period last year, said MySupermarket. This translated to a boost in market share, according to the site, which has 50,000 monthly shoppers. Dolmio accounted for 40% of sales in the pasta category in the 2016 period, compared with 34% in the 2015 period.
Anthony Earley, director at shopper marketing agency Lick Creative, was unsurprised by the figures. The prolific media coverage of Mars’ labelling plans was essentially “free advertising” that “increased brand equity”, he said.
Greg Vallance, managing partner at Honey Creative, claimed the labelling strategy could increase Mars’ appeal among health-conscious shoppers. Consumers who would normally be deterred from buying anything with a red traffic light label would be reassured to know they could eat some of these once a week, he said. “I suspect people appreciate that honesty.”
Nutritionist Glenys Jones agreed consumers were unlikely to be deterred by the publicity, especially if they were regular purchasers of Dolmio. “Many people will buy the same products time and time again to make dishes they know and because of brand loyalty,” she explained.The real test would come when the labelling was introduced on packs, she said. “We know people spend on average 25 to 100 milliseconds looking at nutrition labels in the supermarket, so how the information is displayed will be important,” Jones stressed.
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