Recent Kantar figures show some interesting trends in overall retail in general, and in mushrooms sales in particular. The overall retail market was in very slight growth, less than 1% but in positive territory nonetheless. The two growth areas in retail are in the discounters, and in online shopping. Discounters showed growth in the number of people doing their main shop, and a bigger increase in those doing top up shops. The percentage of Big 4 shoppers (Tesco, Sainsburys, ASDA, Morrisons) who also shop in Aldi or Lidl in any 4 week period is now 39%. Online sales are predicted to be 10% of the market by 2020.
In the vegetable market, 52 week retail figures to the middle of July showed the market in -6.4% value decline, despite a volume growth of 2%. Against this background, mushrooms are performing really well, with a 2.8% increase in value to £393 million, and a very slight increase in volume to 124 thousand tonnes. Shoppers in the 35-44 year old age group are growing well, as are the over 65’s. Chestnuts, Buttons, Exotics, Flat/Open and Sliced all grew ahead of the market in the latest year.
Part of the reason for the improved market performance has been the continued investment by the mushroom sector in marketing campaigns to promote mushrooms, co-financed by the European Union. The More to Mushrooms campaign ran in the UK from 2010 to 2013 with a budget of €2.4 million, and the follow on €2.7 million Just Add Mushrooms campaign in the UK and Ireland is running from 2013 to 2016.
Source: BordBia – Mushroom Market Continues To Show Some Growth
