FMCG sales see marginal improvement in February: Nielsen

BENGALURU/KOLKATA: A researcher Nielsen said overall FMCG sales improved marginally month-on-month in February, while there has been a massive surge in sales for hygiene products, staples and processed food in the one month period from mid-February to mid-March with consumers preparing themselves for restricted living during the lockdown and increased awareness on hygiene.
Nielsen expects consumption to continue in India post the Covid-19 outbreak, but there will be uneven growth in categories whereby it will be revising its growth forecast for the market. Indian FMCG industry growth rate has been on a downward trajectory for the last three quarters.

“We don’t expect things to come to a standstill and consumption will go on after Covid-19 lockdown,” Prasun Basu, South Asia Zone president of Nielsen Global Connect, told newspersons in a virtual press conference on Thursday.

“There will be sky-rocketing sales of certain categories, while consumers will trade off few other categories. We had earlier estimated some recovery from the second quarter of the year and it’s going to be a good year. But there will certainly be a Covid-19 effect,” he said.

As per Nielsen, the overall FMCG market grew by 8% in February as compared to 5% in January and December, and 6% in November. Hygiene categories reported significant growth in February, such as hand sanitiser growing by 53% as compared to 11% growth in the previous three months. Even floor and toilet cleaners grew at a faster pace.

In packaged food, the growth rate in February accelerated to 10% as compared to 7% in January and December, and 8% in November. In non-food segments, there was 5% growth in February and compared to 1% in January and 3% each in preceding two months. Nielson said there was some impact of one extra day of consumption in February since this has been a leap year.


Nielsen said consumers undertook precautionary buying across channels in last one month whereby sales growth of branded pulses went up from 16% to 72% and packaged atta from 20% to 25% in traditional stores between mid-Feb to mid-March. Sales growth of hand sanitiser doubled in these stores to 144%, liquid hand wash went up to 42% from 28%, antiseptic liquid from 6% to 39%, and even widely penetrated toilet soap went up by one percentage point.

In e-commerce, average orders too surged for staples with edible oil growing by 106%, salty snacks by 84%, soft drink by 68% and biscuit by 31% on a weekly basis in last one month till last week. Sales of hand sanitiser reported 1425% growth, face mask grew over four times, hand wash by 86%, floor and toilet cleaner by 77%.

Nielsen said with increasing preventive mindset, categories like cough syrups, gloves and masks have witnessed high growth in the first two weeks of March.