Alcohol led Christmas shopping sales growth
Altogether, alcohol accounted for €111 million in sales, up 26% on the same eight-week period in 2019.
Accounting for 30% of total incremental Christmas shopping sales growth alcohol was the biggest contributor to market value growth this Christmas according to Nielsen’s Total Store Read Scantrack + Discounters in the eight-week period to the 27th of December 2020, with nine of the top 20 products being alcohol or alcohol-related (lager, table wines, stout, whiskey, cider, spirit mixers, gin, ale & sparkling wines).
This represents a big change from the growth trends seen in 2019 which featured no alcohol in the Top 20.
Altogether, alcohol accounted for €111 million in sales, up 26% on the same eight-week period in 2019.
Sparkling Wine & Champagne saw exceptional growth over the Christmas period with values up 47% on the same period in 2019 and volumes up 65% while prices dropped by 11%. Sales of pre-mixed spirits grew by 150% during this eight-week period (131% MAT) while at 32%, non/low alcohol sales grew behind the MAT rate of 42% for this category.
According to Nielsen, 49 million litres of beer and 13 million litres of wine were purchased for the Christmas dinner.
Multipack preference type
As a result of the pandemic, smaller gatherings in homes led to growth of ‘more convenient’ options for consumers purchasing in bulk. For example, medium and large multipacks of beer increased their share of sales by almost 10% in the eight-week period to the 27th of December compared to the same period the previous year.
But in the Carbonated Soft Drinks category, large multi-packs fell behind in favour of medium multi-packs. Medium multi-packs accounted for 59% of the incremental value growth, while the value share of large multi-packs fell by 3% (to a 15% share of the CSD category) when compared to the same period in 2019.
