Housewares Business-to-business magazine for housewares retailers and their suppliers
Increasing exposure of food processors and kitchen machines on television cooking programmes has given a significant boost to sales.
According to new figures from GfK, over the last 12 months the food prep market has grown by 2.3% in volume and an impressive 17.25% in value. And the largest value growth – at over 35% – has come from high-ticketed kitchen machines, which now account for nearly a quarter of all money spent on food preparation, second only to food processors.
Online sales contribute 43% of value for kitchen machines, reflecting a price premium of £26 per machine as consumers seek out higher specification products on the internet. A major contributory factor to this difference in price is the lack of cheap brands being sold online, giving the named brands more exposure and a larger share.
All channels have exhibited good growth, but the fastest growing is mail order and internet pure players, which now take over a third of all value and nearly a third of all volume of kitchen machines sold in the 12 months to April 2012.
GfK says the small appliances market as a whole has shown resilience over the year. In volume it achieved only 1% growth, but market value increased by 5.1% and the main contributor was small kitchen appliances, which grew by nearly 9% over the period. Much of this rise was driven by the on-going success of premium categories such as high-end food prep and beverage makers.
