The market for private-label products in Europe’s grocery sector hit €302B last year, new data from PLMA and NielsenIQ has shown, with the value share of store brands growing by +1.2% on a pan-European basis. Private labels now account for 37% of sales in the European grocery channel, the data reported by ESM magazine showed.
NielsenIQ surveyed 17 markets for PLMA’s International Private Label Yearbook, 16 of which reported growth in private-label sales last year. The only exception, Switzerland, saw a marginal decline of -0.4%.
Of the countries included in the study, four have a private-label share of more than 40%, while the private-label share is above 30% in 11 markets.
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GROWING MARKETS FOR PLs
The biggest growth in private-label share was seen in Czechia (+3.5%), Portugal (+2.9%), Spain (+2.2%), and Hungary (+2.2%), while Switzerland holds the highest store brand share of any European country, at 51.6%.
Other countries with a significant private-label share include Spain (43.3%), Portugal (39%), the Netherlands (44.0%), Belgium (37.8%), and Austria (35.4%), while Europe’s largest markets, Germany, United Kingdom, and France, have a collective private-label share of 38.5%.
Elsewhere, in Belgium and the Netherlands, the combined private-label share grew 0.9%, while Scandinavian markets saw a combined share growth of 1.1%, with the highest growth reported in Denmark (+1.8%).
TOP CATEGORIES
According to NielsenIQ data, perishable and frozen food, paper products, and ambient food are the top three categories of private-label value share with an average of 50%. This represents approximately €212.8B in sales across 17 European countries tracked. “Consumers in Europe clearly turned to private-label acknowledging the quality and price value,” PLMA said in its report.