The increase was mostly driven by inflation. According to Eurostat, rising food prices last year were 4%. Consumption was in a slight increase, but the Romanians have not migrated to higher price segments.
From the point of view of buying behavior, families in Romania went as often as compared to last year, while the average amount paid for buying a purchase went up by 6%.
Discount shops take the edge for home shopping
Throughout 2018, modern commerce has gained even greater importance for consumer-grown consumer goods.These formats currently hold 62% of spending, almost 2 percentage points higher than in 2017.
The Romanians left most of the money in hypermarkets, but they were rarely visited to buy home products. Instead, discount stores and supermarkets have increased their market share as a result of the larger amounts left by families in these formats. Modern convenience stores also strengthened their home shopping position and managed to attract more buyers in 2018 than in 2017.
Dairy products had the highest growth
In terms of home purchases, all segments of current consumer goods registered increases during 2018, influenced by larger purchase baskets. We notice the fastest evolution among dairy products for which the Romanians spent 9% more. The household care products segment also recorded a significant increase (+ 7%), while personal care products evolved at the same pace as the market. In terms of food, both packaged and fresh foods had a dynamics of about 6% in value. For the beverage segment (alcoholic and non-alcoholic), we see a modest increase of 4%.
