|
Key Findings
 Share of Modern Self Service Retailing in Asia Pacific is Expected to Exceed 50% by 2005 |
|
Korea Leads Asia Pacific with Highest Hypermarkets Density |
|
Convenience Stores Mushrooming in China Driving the Asia Pacific Boom |
|
The Emerging Personal Care Stores Not to be Overlooked |
The Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) sector was alive and kicking in Southeast Asia in 2004, in marked contrast to its North Asian counterparts. According to the 2005 ACNielsen ShopperTrends, Southeast Asia enjoyed the fastest growth in 2004, in Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines in particular, recording double-digit value sales growth.
While this growth can be attributed - at least partly - to increased retail prices caused by rising oil prices, there was also significant underlying growth. Additionally, Thailand was not far behind these three countries, enjoying another year of strong growth with sales increasing by eight percent.
It was a very different picture across the rest of Asia, with most North Asian markets flat year-on-year, except for China. In the Pacific, both Australia and New Zealand continued to show positive trends, with sales growth of five to six percent, much the same as in 2003.
Modern Trade Development
The Asia Pacific region continues to catch up with global retailing trends in terms of retail structure, with the modern self-service trade continuing to grow ahead of the overall market, leading to a three percent shift in its share of trade for Asia.
At the moment, the share of the modern trade is running at 47 percent and we expect it to continue to climb and pass 50 percent by the end of 2005.
In North Asia, nearly two-thirds of all grocery sales are now made through the modern trade. Over the last three years there has been a near 10 percent shift in business away from the traditional trade, led by the continued rapid development of the market in China. With the total number of self-service stores increasing by over 35 percent to 54,000, the modern trade now accounts for more than half of all grocery turnover in China.
Korea was the other market in North Asia seeing major changes during 2004, with the growth in Large Format stores leading to the decline in importance of the traditional trade to just 25 percent. There are now over 250 large format stores in Korea, with more than five stores per million people. Korea now has the highest density of this store format in the Asia Pacific region.
However, the pace of development in South-East Asia is much slower; it is being driven primarily by the rapid market change in Indonesia where the modern trade now accounts for 30 percent of sales. This growth has been driven by the increase in new stores openings including 90 Hypermarkets nationally and a dramatic 40 percent increase in the number of minimarkets to 5,600.
This store format has proved very successful in Indonesia with one in seven urban grocery shoppers using them as their main store and over 60 percent using them regularly.
In South Asia, while the development of modern trade seems to be in its infancy, it is starting to accelerate. In India, there are now over 2,400 supermarkets, which account for 10 percent of total grocery sales within the 28 urban towns under modern trade coverage. Just over a quarter of all Indian household shoppers have used a supermarket during the last month. Supermarkets also accounted for 10 percent of sales in Sri Lanka during 2004.
Convenience Stores
Meanwhile Convenience Stores continued their booming momemtum from 2003, recording more than 10,000 new store openings in 2004 in Asia Pacific, an increase of over 14 percent over the previous year. The Convenience Store format has been the most fast moving in China, with more than 60 percent of all new stores coming from this market, resulting in China hitting the 20,000 store mark nationwide.
Most Asian countries experienced a 10 percent increase in new stores, with the exception being Japan, where there was little change despite the country still leading the way with nearly 43,000 stores. Taiwan, however, has the highest store density, with 8,000 stores throughout the country or one store per 2,800 people. As revealed by ACNielsen | ShopperTrends 2005, 80 percent of urban grocery household shoppers in Taiwan visit a convenience store each week, with an average number of visits per month reaching 14. The convenience store format also continued to grow in Hong Kong during 2004, with 10 percent more shoppers using them on a weekly basis.
In South-East Asia, Thailand leads the way in convenience store development, with 10 percent of sales passing through this channel. Half of all urban shoppers use them weekly, visiting an average of two to three times a week. There is still plenty of room for growth though, with only 64 stores per million people across the country as a whole.
Hypermarkets
Across Asia, hypermarket/large format stores are now the dominant format in urban areas of five countries, namely Thailand, Taiwan, Korea, China and Malaysia with about 45 to 60 percent of urban household shoppers using them as the main outlet for the majority of their packaged groceries. In Thailand in particular, 90 percent of urban shoppers use hypermarkets at least once a month and the market possesses the highest proportion of loyal hypermarket shoppers. However there is still plenty of room to further expand the shopper base throughout Asia as the number of stores continue to increase. And it’s worth noting that sales growth for the hypermarket format is mostly driven by an increase in the average frequency of visiting in most countries where shoppers visit them between two to four times a month.
Personal Care Stores
As ACNielsen’s ShopperTrends 2005 reveals, the Personal Care Store format is another channel of tremendous potential and one not to be overlooked. While at the moment only less than 40 percent of household shoppers are using them regularly, there is plenty of room for expansion. Among all markets, Hong Kong is by far the most developed for this store format, with 90 percent of shoppers using them each month and typically visiting more than once a week.
Traditional Trade
Amid the buoyant development of the modern trade throughout Asia Pacific, the total number of traditional grocery stores remained fairly steady during 2004, at 11.4 million. In the Philippines, store numbers continue to grow and reached 590,000 outlets, an increase of over 40,000 stores compared to 2003. The substantial rise in store numbers also led to an increase in the share of trade to 57 percent of grocery sales, making the Philippines the only country where the traditional trade is gaining share from self-service stores. Together with India, Sri Lanka and Indonesia, the four countries have the highest store density of at least 6,000 grocery stores per million of population.
In terms of penetration, three quarters of the urban population in Southeast Asia still use the traditional trade regularly, at least once every other day, particularly for impulse categories.
With the exception of Korea and Japan, Asian shoppers continue to use Wet Markets as their main place to buy fresh food, with the vast majority regularly using them three to five times a week.
About ACNielsen ShopperTrends
Conducted annually, ShopperTrends is the only consistent region-wide survey providing retailers with insights in shopping behaviour and key trends in the Asia Pacific region, factors driving shopper satisfaction and loyalty. It allows key retailers to assess their store, compare the relative level of development of each country and quantify the potential for development. It also helps understand shoppers’ awareness and usage of private labels. The 2005 ACNielsen’s ShopperTrends polled nearly 15,000 urban households across 14 Asia Pacific markets namely Australia, New Zealand, China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea, Japan, India, Indonesia, , Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
ACNielsen, a VNU business, is the world’s leading marketing information provider. Offering services in more than 100 countries, the unit provides measurement and analysis of marketplace dynamics and consumer attitudes and behaviour. Clients rely on ACNielsen’s market research, proprietary products, analytical tools and professional service to understand competitive performance, to uncover new opportunities and to raise the profitability of their marketing and sales campaigns. To learn more, visit www.acnielsen.com.
|
