In March, sales of packaged food in the retail sector came to a standstill. However, this does not particularly affect the positive trend since the beginning of the year. This is what emerges from the latest surveys conducted by IRI for TUTTOFOOD 2021: compared to the same month in 2020, almost all product categories have recorded negative numbers, ranging from -1.2% for Grocery to -21% for Pasta. The only exceptions are the +10.3% registered by Between Meals Sweets (with sales for €195 million) and the amazing +459% of Recurring Products, for a value of sales worth 263 million.

An adjustment after a year off the chart

Rather than a real step backwards, this is an adjustment from the anomalous figures recorded last year in the middle of the 'hard' lockdown during the first wave. Indeed, the figures since the beginning of 2021 remain almost all in positive territory. Packaged food as a whole is up 3.7 compared to 2020 and the value of sales remains above 13 billion (€13,192 million). Recurrences also excelled in the quarterly figures (+134.7%; €372 million), while increases in other commodities were in single digit. Pre-cooked food (+5.1%; 67 million), Between Meals Sweets (+4.8%; 547 million) and Ice cream (+4.2%; 91 million) did particularly well, with the latter registering a slight growth also in March (+1.1%; 47 million: more than half of the entire quarterly expenditure).

Packaged Meat (+3.4%; 248 million) and Fresh Pasta (+3.4%; 217 million) had also great results. On the other hand, the Beverage sector is still on standby, affected by delays in the reopening of the out-of-home market: in February, the Beverage Wholesalers Channel recorded a -44.9% drop compared to the same month in 2020 (value of sales of €119 million), but is slowly improving compared to the -56.3% of the beginning of the year (sales for €191 million).