40% increase in sales of essentials at Kirana stores during lockdown

New Delhi: There has been an increase of 40 per cent in consumer expenditure on essential goods at Kirana stores since the imposition of the countrywide lockdown, said a study by SnapBizz. SnapBizz is a Bengaluru-based company which provides new-age solutions to convert the neighbourhood retail and grocery stores.

According to the report, there was a major spike in sales in Mid-March as an indication of panic buying that took place followed by a low spell till Easter weekend, post which, sales have improved. The study also found a decline in the number of Kirana stores operating ever since the lockdown took effect for various reasons.

The study analysed over 1.7 million consumer bills recorded in the SnapBizz network of Kirana stores spreads across 7 cities which include Delhi NCR, Mumbai, Pune, Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad.

The report further added that before lockdown, the FMCG brands/distributors used to chase the retailers to supply more goods and the retailers used to chase the consumers to sell the goods to them.

While after the imposition of lockdown, the consumers are chasing the retailers for supplies. And the retailers are chasing the distributors /brands for replenishments.

“There has been a steep increase in sales of essentials in Kirana stores. Our data shows that there was a steep increase in sales (by 30%) per consumer from mid-March onwards and further rose by another 30% by end-March. But in the past few weeks, we have seen a slight drop in spends per consumer even though it is still high (40% more than usual),” added the study.

It attributed the increase to panic buying, more people staying and cooking at home, and more premium products being pushed by retailers due to more availability and/or more margins.

We studied over 1 million transactions across 94 categories in Kirana stores that are billing actively during the lockdown situation and there was not even a single instance of Kirana stores selling above MRP.

And out of these 1 million transactions before lockdown, around 50% of the items were sold below MRP while during lockdown only around 38% items were sold under MRP.

Prem Kumar, Founder and CEO, SnapBizz said: “In this current time of lockdown, we have been witnessing the steady and continued operations of the local Kirana stores. They have been trying their best to keep their stores open, selling whatever they have been supplied with at best prices without taking advantage of the situation.”

“The report gives in-depth analysis into the entire food and beverage category and the impact that COVID-19 has had on its selling pattern, availability and pricing,” added Kumar.

Since the lockdown started, on a daily basis, only around a third of our Kirana stores operating, as per the study.

A shop owner, Divyamaan Shekhawat told ANI,” When lockdown started there was almost 200 per cent increase in sales. We receive almost double the number of customers with double the needs, people mostly buying things like noodles, coffee etc., now increased sales have come to 30 per cent. (ANI)