Own label brands- way forward for Supermarkets in economic crisis! – Dr Rohantha Athukorala 

One third of the income of a typical Sri Lankan household that has been spent on groceries now shot up by 60% given the current pressure on the disposable income for an average Sri Lankan, says former Chairman of the Sri Lankan Export Development Board and a Commissioner General for Sri Lanka at World Expo in Milan, Dr Rohantha Athukorala,

Addressing a Keells forum recently Dr Athukorala said that the outcome of this change was now impacting the A and B social economic groups.

 In fact for many consumer goods the year 2022 saw the overall business declining by as high as twenty percent is the latest data revealed by Kantar Household panel said Dr Athukorala. This is the challenge that Sri Lanka is faced with in the backdrop of inflation at seventy percent and interest rates at thirty percent. Going to the specifics, he cited that those households who buy 25+ categories have dropped from 48% to 26% in the A SEC group whilst in the B SEC group it has dropped from 42% to 22% which is the volatility in the marketplace even on the top two tiers of the social strata said Athukorala who heads the foremost Artificial Intelligence company for brand mapping Clootrack Sri Lanka, Maldives and Pakistan.

 Given this backdrop, one way that responsible Supermarket chain can help the Sri Lankan household is by developing own label brands like the Keells brand of products. Even though the switching from own label brands to conventional brands takes place, may be this time around it will happen at a larger scale due to the pressure on the purse. The current pricing strategy of Keells own branded products being priced at 10% lower than comparable brands covering multiple product categories is the right way to use this strategy as even the AB SEC groups are cash strapped as per the Kanta consumer wallet survey said Athukorala.