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After months of planning and engagement with partners and speakers, the Trade Intelligence Independent Trade Forum took to the virtual stage this week. And a bumper two days of discussion, information sharing, and debate it was. What were the big themes?
Collaboration and partnership: These are essential in the independent FMCG trade; no one solution can succeed in isolation due to its many interweaving dynamics. A one-size fits all approach won’t cut it and we must embrace and leverage the many available solutions.
Loyalty and relationships: Between suppliers and wholesalers/traders, and wholesalers/traders with their shoppers, loyalty is the keystone, facilitating overall success among all stakeholders in the trade. Be honest, play with open cards, be loyal.
Unemployment: The informal sector is ideally positioned to create employment, and innovatively so, often by virtue of its informal nature.
Technology and digital enablers: The sector is ready for it and needs technology to grow, to support the security and safety of cash exchanges, delivery platforms, e-commerce or job creation. Let’s use it.
Africa: Informal spazas and independent wholesale businesses are the cornerstone of trade in Africa; nothing about them being informal makes them informal. They are different and that’s what has makes them succeed.

Comment: A massive thank you to all our partners – Smollan, DataOrbis, Twizza, and Diplomat – and to the speakers, and delegates for making ITF 2021 the success it was. Now let’s get out there and make brilliance happen.

The key metric for Shoprite, it seems, has always been market share – defending it fiercely when it needs to, talking it up when it can, proudly sitting it atop the shoulders of both sales and profit when it comes to results time. Thus, the claim in its latest investment presentation that the Group has enjoyed a +R4.5bn gain in profitable market share in the 53 weeks through July. Shoprite also noted that NielsenIQ has estimated that its supermarket brands, including Checkers and Usave, had registered 28 months of uninterrupted market share gains. The excitingly punctuated research outfit found, moreover, that Shoprite had made a gain in market share of +0.94% for the trading period in question. Shoprite’s South African supermarkets – the heart of the business – increased trading profit by +17% to R9.4bn for the period, on an impressive trading margin of 7%. A sizeable chunk of this success is due to investments in technology in recent years. “In addition to transforming how we operate, our IT re-platforming has facilitated and fast-tracked our transformation as part of our digital and data-led future strategy,” notes CEO Pieter Engelbrecht.

Comment: A South African retail icon, going from strength to strength in the toughest of times.

South Africa’s retailers are throwing themselves behind South Africa’s National Nutrition Week initiative this week, in recognition that our great industry is on the frontlines of the food security crisis. SPAR, for example, has launched a ‘One 4 You, One 4 Me’ campaign for the month of October, where customers can purchase any two SPAR Mageu 1-litre products for R22, and then pop one carton into the trolley at the front of every store. At the end of the campaign, stores will give all donated stock to local charities, and SPAR will donate R1.50 for every carton sold during this campaign period to Operation Hunger. Woolworths has a range of different food security programmes including support for sustainable food systems that create livelihoods in regenerative agriculture and empower South Africans to secure their own food supply in support of the Nutrition Week goal of #zerohunger 2030. For over 30 years, Woolies has donated food that is past its ‘sell by date’ but within the ‘use by date’ directly from the stores to local charities.

Comment: Just two of the many initiatives. It would be great to see an industry-wide initiative though, to partner with the Government in eliminating hunger.

Big news for pharmaceutical retailers this week is that the Government has approved the sale of HIV medications without a doctor’s prescription, including PrEP (pre-exposure prophylaxis), PEP (post-exposure prophylaxis) and first-line anti-retrovirals (ARVs). “It’s long overdue that pharmacists are able to best use their clinical expertise to play a valuable role in contributing to ending the high burden of HIV in South Africa,” says Dis-Chem. In other pandemic-related news, Shoprite has become the first retailer to recycle the wipes used to sanitise baskets and trolleys in its stores, in partnership with Sani-Touch, which provides it with these unexpected necessities. In other Shoprite-related news, Checkers and Pick n Pay went head-to-head on discounts, as the former launched its “inaugural Xtra Xtra Weekend” to kick off three days of specials devoted to its loyalty programme holders last weekend, and the latter strived to remind punters that they thought of the whole loyalty thing first with its “Smart Sale” for Smart Shoppers. And speaking of Pick n Pay, its Boxer brand is launching a second Boxer Superstore in Qumbu, in its Eastern Cape heartland. And speaking of Boxer, its performance was reported as being instrumental in achieving the Pick n Pay Group’s positive HY2022 results, but more on that next week. In the meantime, have a look at our snappy results summary here.

Comment: Busy, busy businesses. Good to see.

SPAR Ireland has launched a new partnership with pioneering food waste app Too Good To Go, in which participating stores will select a range of short shelf-life products that remain in perfect condition but are unlikely to be sold on the day, package them into ‘Surprise Bags’, place the bags for reservation via the Too Good To Go app, and even sell the bags in store for a third of the original value. In France, Carrefour has unveiled a new ‘personal shopper’ home delivery service, OK Market!, offering same-day delivery on a range of 20,000 SKUs, including – crucially for the French market – cut-to-order fresh products such as meat and cheese. In the US, Kroger is intensifying its partnership with robo-retailer Ocado Group to build new fulfilment centres that expand its food delivery offerings in Florida and California, and to extend the service in the Northeast. And in the UK, Asda is extending its one-hour delivery service to another 96 stores, allowing punters access to the full 30,000 SKU range, provided they buy more than 70 items.

Comment: The confluence of delivery and tech has revolutionised our industry in ways we’re only beginning to grasp.

The Coca-Cola Company (hereinafter referred to as “Coke”) is betting heavily on Africa’s recovery from the depredations of COVID-19, if president for Africa, Bruno Pietracci, is to be believed. “We’re bullish about Africa and South Africa, and fuelling that optimism with investments – not only to connect with consumers but with the trade and our manufacturing facilities – is critical for us,” says Mr P. Coke’s 2021 and 2022 investments on the continent already exceed pre-pandemic levels and it tailors its strategy to regional demands so that things like pack size, packaging design, price and refrigeration take into account a country’s energy supply, consumer demographics and disposable income. Be this as it may, as part of a refresh to the company’s operating model, the African business is for the first time plugged directly into the Atlanta headquarters. This, says Mr P, provides Cola-Cola Africa the “freedom to be the masters of our own destiny”.

Comment: Economically, the innovations forced upon us by COVID-19 may prove to be a blessing in disguise. But it’s still too early to tell.

Unilever has announced that it has produced, and brought to market, a washing detergent made using actual carbon emissions. Appropriately, the dishwashing liquid is made under its Sunlight brand, sunlight being the commodity that by now should have been powering all of our planetary endeavours. The innovation aligns with Le Grand Bleu’s global Clean Future strategy to eliminate carbon derived from fossil fuels in its cleaning and laundry products by 2030. The captured carbon used in the liquid is known as purple carbon in Unilever’s Carbon Rainbow model, and has been drawn from industrial emissions, purified and recycled for use in products that currently depend on fossil fuel-based inputs, which are called black carbon. “Introducing purple carbon into Sunlight dishwashing liquid represents a deliberate shift away from the fossil fuel economy and is a critical step in our commitment to achieving net zero emissions from our products by 2039,” says Home Care Africa VP Lethepu Matshaba.

Comment: A revolutionary step, and one which all such businesses would do well to emulate. Innovation and investment by leading businesses like Unilever is essential if we’re going to get ourselves out of this mess.

Last week we incorrectly recorded that Appletiser is a brand of Pioneer. A vigilant reader pointed out that all of the Tiser brands are, of course, manufactured under licence by Appletiser South Africa (ASA), which is part of the bottling operations of Coca-Cola Beverages South Africa (CCBSA). CCBSA has recalled 37,000 cases of potentially contaminated Appletiser from the market; Pioneer has taken similar precautions with some of its Liquifruit and Ceres products, as has Woolies with its own brand of apple juice. Supplier to all four, Elgin Fruit Juice (PTY) LTD, is being investigated as the source of the contamination.

Retail trade sales grew +4.9% month on month for August, and before you break out the bubbly, remember that this came off an -11.1% during the looting and unrest of July, and that economists were expecting it to come through closer to +9.5%. On the upside – and it’s a slim upside – this is likely to restrain the hand of the Reserve Bank from upping the interest rate, which somewhat understandably remains at historic lows. By contrast, industrial production and mining figures recorded growth of +7.6% YOY (although they declined -2.4% month on month) on the back of a global commodities boom. And it must be pointed out that manufacturing production also declined precipitously in July. All well and good, but how are things looking in the months ahead? Pretty dicey, according to Virág Fórizs, magnificently named Africa economist at Capital Economics. “Persistent power cuts, and more restrictive lockdown measures to curb a fourth wave that the authorities expect in Q4, will weigh on activity. And the government’s fiscal consolidation plan will keep dampening demand,” he wrote recently.

Comment: Unfortunate that we couldn’t manage a hastier recovery. But understandable under the circs.