Instore Index Analysis - value is still king

by James Quilter , promotionsandincentives.co.uk 12-Nov-09, 12:17

LONDON - Whether you regard Halloween as an US imported nuisance, bags of fun or simply a great way to feeding the kids, there's no doubt the festival is firmly entrenched in UK stores. Confectionery appears to have replaced alcohol as the most heavily promoted category in-store.

This is most notable in October's Instore Index, which features Cadbury, Mars and Nestle Rowntree in the top 10. Out of these three only Nestle, which focused on activity for its Matchmakers and Quality Street brands, appeared to have an eye on Christmas market.

However despite the focus on Halloween, it was Procter & Gamble babyware brand Pampers that stole the show. The brand accrued 122 points, the most a brand has collected in the four-month history of the Index, and in doing so beat Cadbury to the number one spot by half a point.

Overall the leading offers are still predominantly multibuys and single price specials rather than the infamous bogof. This continues a trend seen since the first Index in July where the offer has been in decline.

Morrisons
Morrisons continues its ‘Price Cut’ messaging, which provides one of the strongest value messages across the four stores. Like the other supermarkets it has devoted a lot of space to ‘trick or treating’ although with the proximity of the festive season it was easy to see this activity being converted to cover Christmas.

Out of the four stores Morrisons is both the most likely to feature free standing units as well as products promoted outside their traditional category.

Tesco
Like last month Tesco maintained a strong push behind its double ClubCard points message, which was reinforced on all POS as a secondary message. Out of all four grocers Tesco was the one most heavily weighted towards bogofs and half-price deals.

Sainsbury’s
Similar to Tesco with its Double ClubCard points, Sainsbury’s has spent a lot of effort emphasising its own double points deal via Nectar and its financial services arm. Another element is the appearance of ‘only 50p’ messaging within the aisles themselves.

Promotional marketing campaigns
Yet another poor month in terms of support for promotional marketing campaigns. The initial aim for this month was to compare how Coca-Cola and Budweiser’s World Cup promotions were promoted in-store and through convenience stores. However this proved impossible as neither promotion had a presence outside of the big four grocers.

The Instore Index is conducted with retail research and shopper marketing agency Retail Why.

Read more on P&I

Instore Index October

Instore Index September