With confectionery aplenty, Easter can help drive bigger margins in the run-up to and during the spring season.
By Elena Dimama
Seasonal occasions such as Easter provide a great opportunity for retailers to showcase high-performing ranges and highlight the bestselling categories.
Easter is one of those calendar events that retailers can use to promote lines for a longer period of time, with confectionery able to play a major role in it.
Sweet season
Whether as a main gift or to complement bigger gifts, confectionery sales are growing in independent and symbol stores as more consumers opt for local shopping, according to Snackchat.
Meanwhile, more affluent shoppers tend to buy seasonal confectionery, with seasonal confectionery shoppers having a £12.50 higher spend per visit, according to Lumina. What’s more, over 50% of shoppers buy chocolates and flowers together, offering more opportunities to trade up.
NPD will be key once again this Easter season, with new products expected to drive the occasion, according to the NIQ Scantrack’s data to April 2023.
“Easter 2024 will see the launch of the Cadbury Creme Egg Tablet,” Susan Nash, Trade Communications Manager at Mondelez International, notes. “[It] sees the iconic brand taken into this format for the first time ever in the UK.
“As one of the UK’s favourite Easter SKUs, the Cadbury Creme Egg brand sees buy-in from one-in-four households during the Easter season, allowing it to achieve an incredible brand awareness of 95%. With this new tablet format added to the catalogue, perfect for both sharing and self-treat occasions, retailers will be able to use the irresistible allure of the Cadbury Creme Egg to drive their fast start to the season and repeat purchase rate.”
The brand’s Cadbury Mini Eggs are also coming back, having grown by 19% in 2023, according to Nielsen Insights. Moreover, the Cadbury Mini Eggs Bar, a 360g gifting format, will be available nationwide for the first time.
Meanwhile, Kervan Gida UK is launching Dexters Dynaeggs for this year’s Easter. The new product boasts candy-coated milk chocolate eggs with a chewy jelly gummy centre.
“Stocking up early will ensure an extended selling period for this Jurassic-ally delightful treat, offering multiple purchase occasions. “This is a delicious and fun product to fill a gap in the market and will bring in new consumers to the seasonal confectionery aisle generating incremental sales for retailers,” Jonathan Drake, National Account Manager at Kervan Gida, UK, says. “The £1 price point also presents a strong opportunity to drive profit.”
He adds: “These eggs can be displayed on hanging bag fixtures or as part of Easter displays using the shelf ready display unit. We expect shoppers to buy them for multiple occasions as they are perfect for self-treating, sharing, egg hunts, or decorating Easter bakes.”
To make the most of the season, retailers should split Easter into three phases: getting off to a fast start (from now until Valentine’s Day), building momentum (from Valentine’s Day on 14 February, to Mother’s Day on 10 March), and then gearing up for a ‘gifting finish’ for the last three weeks as the period reaches its finale.
Retailers should note that 70% of Easter sales pre-Valentine’s Day are Mini Eggs and Filled Eggs, and should focus on the Top 10 SKUs to help signpost the incoming Easter season.
For a fast start to the season, Mondelez suggests that retailers:
- be ready on day one of the season with sufficient stock of seasonal self-eat and sharing favourites from well-loved brands, such as Cadbury Creme Egg and Cadbury Mini Eggs;
- create awareness of the season with your customers using campaigns, competitions and promotions as a talking point;
- use POS from shoppers’ favourite Easter brands to highlight products and optimise incremental sales.
