The year got off to a slow start for families who spent 907 million euros on home purchases in January. It is a growth of 13.1% compared to the same month last year, which corresponds to 105 million euros more in supermarket checkouts.
The data comes from Nielsen and shows that the biggest increases were in dairy, which grew 24% year-over-year, and grocery, which rose 14%. In total, of the 907 million euros spent in supermarkets and hypermarkets, 378.2 million corresponded to groceries, 48 million more than in January 2022. Dairy products spent 171.4 million euros, a year-on-year increase of 33.5 million.
Groceries and dairy products together accounted for 60.6% of the supermarket bill. Spending on frozen foods increased by 7%, but its weight in total spending fell from 7.4% in January 2022 to 7% this year. Nevertheless, the frozen copies weighed a total of 63.5 million euros, compared to 59.3 million in January last year.
Less in the bag and wallet
Knowing that food inflation was 18.5% in January (and rose to 20.1% in February, according to the National Institute of Statistics), the 13.1% increase in sales in Consumption shows that households are making fewer purchases. take home to cope with rising prices.
This practice shows that Portuguese consumers are continuing the trend that had already started in 2022 at the beginning of the year.
As Dinheiro Vivo moved forward last week, last year, real expenditure (without inflation) of people on food fell by 2.3% compared to 2021, an even bigger drop than in the time of the troika. In 2022 there were 573 million euros less, according to data from INE.
Another sign of the decline in purchasing power is the rise of distribution’s own brands, the so-called “white brands”, which rose by 27.2%, more than double the market growth. Manufacturer brands, on the other hand, only grew by 4.2%.
Distribution brands already account for 43.1% of total supermarket spending, compared to 38.8% a year ago. This means that of the 907 million euros spent by families, 391 million went on branded goods. In foods, the weight of “white labels” is even more significant, going from 45% a year ago to 49.5% now.
No wonder then that it is the large supermarkets – a category that also includes chains such as Lidl, Mercadona or Aldi in the Nielsen universe, in which own brands have a significant weight in the total assortment – that grew the most, with a year-on-year year increase of 17.7%.
price control
It is recalled that last week 80 inspectors from the Food and Economic Security Authority (ASAE) were on site to inspect the prices of food products in hyper and supermarkets, an action justified by the Secretary of State for Tourism, Trade and Services with the need to understand why Portugal “has an overall inflation rate of 8.6%, below the European Union average of 10%, but with regard to food products, the price of the basket has risen more than twice the rate of inflation, 21.1% “, in the last year.
“It is precisely for this reason, and also because we have increases of 40, 50 and even 70% compared to last year for some products, that we intend to intensify the control on the level of food prices,” continues Nuno Fazenda.
As a result of this action, ASAE filed 10 criminal suits for speculation and 12 administrative offenses for other matters in an inspection of 123 medium and large supermarkets. But the work does not stop there, actions are being taken with suppliers to find explanations for the price increase. Speaking to TSF, ASAE’s Inspector General, Pedro Portugal, explained that this is a lengthy process in which, starting from the analysis of a basket of 20 essential products, it was already possible to observe that the price of at least at least half of these increased by about 50%. Now you have to go back up the chain to understand “why is it that some foods now cost 60 or 70% more than they did at the end of last year”.
More complaints
For now, on the Queixa portal, complaints related to the food segment are increasing, especially in the “Gastronomy, food and beverages” category, which has received 772 complaints since the beginning of the year, 32% more than in the same period of the previous year.
As for hypers and supermarkets, the total number of complaints fell by 4% at the beginning of the year compared to January and February 2022, to a total of 443 complaints. But it is possible to consult various customer complaints on the portal about what they consider to be “brutal increases” in food products or about differences between the marked price and the actual price on the box.
Ilídia Pinto is a journalist for Dinheiro Vivo
Source: DN
