other merchandise
Milking It No Longer Fluid milk lost its spot in the top 10 in-store categories to non-edible grocery
Y
ou know what they say: “There’s no use crying over spilled milk.” This is wise advice for convenience store operators who last year saw their fluid milk sales decline by 2.5 percent per store. In fact, the category fell out of the top 10 in-store categories into the No. 11 spot, replaced by nonedible grocery, which moved into the tenth slot. The milk category, however, wasn’t alone in seeing spoiled sales in 2014. The ice cream and frozen novelties category, along with the health and beauty care (HBC)
category, also posted declines. Ice cream and frozen novelties suffered from a 10.1-percent loss in sales of frozen yogurt/sherbet/sorbet, ending the year with a 0.3-percent overall dip per store.
Fig. 48
Meanwhile, HBC experienced a counterbalance as cosmetics saw another strong year of growth with a 7.7-percent increase, but was offset by a 7.9-percent drop in sales of energy shots, liquid vitamins and
Category Analysis: Edible Grocery
(5.13 percent of in-store sales; 6 percent of in-store gross margin dollar contribution)
Edible grocery saw a stronger sales increase of 3.5 percent last year vs. a 0.1-percent increase in 2013. The largest subcategory, packaged dairy and deli, saw the largest increase of 8 percent, followed by frozen food with a 5.7-percent rise, reversing flat sales from the prior year. AverAge SAleS per Store 2014
Packaged dairy & deli Packaged bread Frozen food Perishable (including produce) All other edible grocery TOTAL
$20,355 11,286 9,937 5,910 22,051 $69,539
% chAnge
8.0% 1.0 5.7 1.5 0.4 3.5%
InduStry totAl (In mIllIonS) 2014
$3,048 1,690 1,488 885 3,302 $10,413
% chAnge
9.7% 2.6 7.4 3.1 2.0 5.1%
Source: Convenience Store News Market Research, 2015
Fig. 49
Category Analysis: General Merchandise
(3.25 percent of in-store sales; 4.68 percent of in-store gross margin dollar contribution)
Seasonal items had another strong year with a 17-percent increase in per-store sales, and automotive rebounded by adding $994 in average sales per store. Telecomm hardware saw the most significant growth of 51.1 percent. AverAge SAleS per Store 2014
Automotive products Phone cards Smoking accessories Seasonal items Batteries Novelties/toys Telecomm hardware Film/photo All other general merchandise TOTAL
$9,610 6,524 4,635 4,167 4,080 2,992 594 240 11,226 $44,068
Source: Convenience Store News Market Research, 2015
56 Convenience Store News | JUNE 2015 | WWW.CSNEWS.COM
InduStry totAl (In mIllIonS)
% chAnge
2014
% chAnge
11.5% 4.5 3.5 17.0 -2.5 3.0 51.1 -54.0 5.0 5.9%
$1,439 977 694 624 611 448 89 36 1,681 $6,599
13.3% 6.2 5.2 18.9 -1.0 4.7 53.4 -53.2 6.7 7.6%