Retailers Shortchanging National Brands

We spent much time and effort examining private retail label versus retail brands.  Was just in a Kroger today and scanned some categories we had worked with, and the evolution of changes wwas stunning.

Are retailers short-changing national grocery brands?     by Tom Ryan in Retailwire, includes expert comment. 

A study from Acosta finds that shoppers overwhelmingly prefer national brands and that pushes toward private labels might be undermining their effectiveness.

Overall, shoppers agreed that “name brands are better than store brands” in 41 of 53 categories, including pet food, beauty & personal care, carbonated soft drinks, coffee and chocolate.

Name and store brands were found to be “about the same” in 12 out of 53. These were most likely in the perimeter (dairy, produce, fresh meat, bakery, etc.) as well as paper products and bottled water.

For no category did respondents believe that store brands are better than name brands.

Generally, the more personal, innovative and differentiated the category, the more likely a shopper is to choose a national brand over a private label brand.

The top three reasons consumers gave for purchasing national brands while grocery shopping included:

“National brand products are higher quality in taste and/or performance.”
“I can get better deals on national brands (through sales/coupons).”
“I trust national brand products more.”
Cost savings was the primary driver of private label brands, and purchases are often viewed as a compromise, the study found.

An accompanying study of over 100 retailers found:
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