Opportunities, even in times of crisis

When a consumer visits a point of sale and opts for a product or category over another, this choice is motivated by a series of impulses, desires and needs that are influenced by social behaviors, economic situation and, of course, the work of brands. With thousands of options on the gondolas, the competition gets even more fierce with each innovation or product version that comes to the market to meet a new demand. And this dispute is accentuated and the complexities are highlighted in moments of low economy, such as those that we have lived in due to Covid-19.
For eight years, people's choices for mass consumer brands have been the subject of analysis by Kantar Brand Footprint, whose ranking data for the Brazilian market have been published exclusively by Meio & Mensagem since 2015. Due to the unprecedented impacts of the pandemic of the new coronavirus on the market, Kantar has this year developed a special chapter on brand performance based on the same ranking parameters: penetration (brand reach) and frequency (number of times the brand is chosen in the POS) that, combined, generate consumer reach point (CRP), an indicator of the brands most chosen by the public.
The study, which analyzes 22,900 brands in 52 countries on five continents, representing 74% of the global population and 85% of GDP, indicated a global decline movement in the CRP in 2019. Worldwide, 46% of brands showed growth in the indicator in 2019, against 47% the previous year. In Brazil, the percentages were 40% and 42%, respectively. However, between January and April 2020, 49% of brazilian brands registered high, against 47% in the same period of 2019.
"Brands that reinvented themselves, showed versatility and invested in communication grew. The consumer has stopped or stopped consumption outside the home and these choices now occur indoors. This movement makes brands that are strong within the home gain space compared to others that consumers only saw in restaurants and snack bars, for example," explains David Fiss, director of customer services & new business at Kantar.
In this context, local brands have gained space. In Brazil, they represented 66% of importance in value between January and April of this year, against 25% of global ones; and 9% of regional ones. In 2019, the percentages were 64%, 26% and 10%, respectively. Food, dairy and substitutes and home care were the most relevant markets for local brands, with importance in value in baskets, in order, 84%, 78% and 75%. The locations also represented 50% in beverages and 38% in personal care.