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November 3, 2026
Pritha Pahari, The Core
3 November 2026
India’s packaged food and soap makers are running out of easy choices. Input costs have continued to rise since late February, when the Middle East conflict began disrupting supply chains and pushing up crude-linked costs.
A visible price hike, however, risks sending shoppers to a rival. To offset this, companies have reduced package sizes. However, scope for how much these packs can be reduced is limited, especially for products already sold at low price points. Take the example of a Rs 10 pack of Parle-G biscuits.
At this price, there is little room to reduce the quantity further without risking consumer dissatisfaction. Cutting the pack size could make the product less attractive, while increasing the price may discourage price-sensitive buyers.
India’s FMCG giants have squeezed pack sizes about as far as they can go. With input costs still climbing and shoppers watching every rupee, the choice between eating the cost and raising prices is coming, likely right after Diwali.
The Hikes Are In
Britannia, Hindustan Unilever (HUL), Dabur and Godrej Consumer had already raised prices by around 2-5% in the June quarter, and were weighing more for the September quarter. FMCG companies have continued to raise prices to offset higher input costs.
FMCG companies have continued to raise prices to offset higher input costs.
Tata Consumer Products increased tea prices by 8-10% between the June and September quarters, while it raised the price of its Rs 30 salt pack to Rs 32 in May and again to Rs 34 in October.
Hindustan Unilever also took price increases of around 7.5% during the September quarter, according to media reports.
Godrej Consumer Products said it would continue calibrated price increases, particularly in soaps and liquid detergents, to manage cost pressures.
Dabur has also confirmed taking pricing actions in its October business update, while Britannia had indicated a further 1.5-2% increase, largely through smaller packs. However, the latter two companies’ September-quarter results were still awaited.
Experts said that lower-income households face greater pressure because everyday essentials take up a larger share of their budgets. Affordable products such as biscuits, noodles, soaps, detergents and cooking oils are particularly sensitive to price changes.
According to experts, some manufacturers are weighing selective price increases after Diwali, possibly from December.
Shoppers haven’t walked away yet
So far, demand is holding up. Nestlé India’s sales rose 20.5 per cent to Rs 6,782 crore in the September quarter, with double-digit volume growth.
At HUL, June-quarter underlying sales growth of 10 per cent came equally from volume and price.
The market is still nervous.
Nestlé India shares closed 7.7% lower on results day after management flagged rising input costs, especially packaging, edible oils and farm commodities.
Business Standard quoted chairman Manish Tiwary as saying, “Rising inflation, particularly food inflation, is a reality.”
India’s FMCG volume growth remains mixed, although several companies continue to report resilient demand. Tata Consumer Products’ India branded volume growth eased from 16% in Q4 FY26 to 13% in Q1 FY27 and 11% in Q2 FY27.
Marico reported that India volume growth reached near double digits in Q2 FY27, following 11% in Q1.
Dabur India recorded 5% underlying volume growth in Q1 FY27, while its October update indicated double-digit revenue growth for Q2 but did not disclose a confirmed volume figure.
Overall, demand remains resilient, but revenue growth should not be confused with volume growth, particularly as companies raise prices to offset higher input costs.
Why Smaller Packs?
Satish Meena, founder of research firm Datum Intelligence, said that companies try to absorb costs first. “They can do it for one quarter, they can do it for two quarters, but at a certain point they have to pass it on to the customer,” he said. He expects much of that to happen after the festive season.
Discounts are not an option either, since margins are thin. That leaves pack sizes. “Instead of 150 grams, we are doing 120 grams, keeping the price the same,” Meena said, describing the move.
A visible price rise carries a risk of its own.
“Your positioning in the shop will change, and customers will also perceive you as an expensive product and look for other brands,” he said. Once a rival takes the shelf space, it is hard to win it back.
Devangshu Dutta, founder of research firm Third Eyesight, says price points are hard to move. “Price points are often anchored either in the consumer’s mind or by competitive benchmark pricing, making them difficult to change,” he said.
He also said the practice now carries a reputation risk. “The shrinkflation phenomenon isn’t new, but social media has given it viral visibility, which can potentially damage brand reputation.”
Pricing Pecking Order
Meena said companies will follow a set order. First they improve buying and supply chains, then trim ad spending. Next they raise prices on premium products, where buyers are more willing to pay. Raising prices across all products comes last, so they don’t lose share.
Dutta says companies are “caught in a vice” because input costs are rising while core shoppers are cautious about spending. Companies have “no option but to cut brand-level advertising and also review overheads deeply.”
Indian FMCG companies are facing rising input costs across several product categories.
In October 2026, plastic packaging costs were reported to have increased by 30–40%, putting pressure on snack makers and household-product manufacturers.
Palm oil prices rose 21% year-on-year in September, while sunflower oil increased 14%, soybean oil 9% and mustard oil 8%.
Sugar prices climbed 18% year-on-year, adding pressure on confectionery and packaged-food producers.
Tea prices rose 10% over the same period. Coffee and cocoa also recorded increases, with Arabica coffee up 19% quarter-on-quarter and cocoa rising 48%. These increases affect biscuits, noodles, chocolates, soaps, shampoos and detergents differently.
Now What?
The next test is HUL’s September-quarter results, due after its board meets on 28 October. Meena does not expect much to change in the next one to two quarters.
He says the pressure is not seasonal. “It’s because of the war happening in the Middle East… it’s a much longer issue for them,” and he points to RBI data showing some impact on demand.
Input-cost pressures could persist into early 2027.
S&P Global’s September outlook projected elevated manufacturing costs through 2027, while October data showed plastic packaging costs 30–40% higher and key polymer prices more than 50% above pre-conflict levels.
Although prices may ease if supply routes improve, these figures suggest FMCG companies could face continued cost pressure over the next two quarters.
Dutta said only a few brands will come through easily. “Few brands or products are able to build longer-term loyalty consistently and whose value to the consumer is stickier than the resistance to price movement.”
For everyone else, the room to raise prices or shrink packs is running out.
(Published in The Core)
admin
May 27, 2026
Writankar Mukherjee and Aanya Thakur, Economic Times
Kolkata/Mumbai, 27 May 2026
Quick commerce has become the dominant online sales channel for India’s top fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) companies, with Dabur India and Britannia Industries among others now deriving up to 75% of their digital sales from 10-minute delivery platforms.
Industry executives said quick commerce is reshaping consumer buying habits and increasingly cannibalising sales from all other channels, including ecommerce platforms, modern trade and kirana stores, even as large online marketplaces and retailers expand into the segment.
Latest data from companies including ITC Ltd, AWL Agri Business, Tata Consumer Products and Parle Products showed quick commerce accounted for 60-75% of their total online sales in FY26, rising sharply from less than half a year earlier.
For Britannia and Tata Consumer Products, quick commerce now contributes more than 70% of online sales, while the share climbed to 75% for Dabur in the fourth quarter ended March from 50% in the December quarter.
Executives said expanding assortments and demand for instant replenishment are accelerating the shift. “Quick commerce has been gaining ground with several ecommerce companies such as BigBasket, Amazon and Flipkart, as well as retail chains like Reliance Retail, entering the space,” said Mayank Shah, vice-president at leading biscuits maker Parle Products. “Given consumers’ demand for convenience and immediate replenishment, quick commerce has emerged as a strong growth opportunity for them.”
Quick commerce accounted for 65% of online sales of Parle Products and AWL Agri Business last fiscal, compared with 50% and 45%, respectively, in FY25. ITC derived 58% of its online sales from this channel in FY26.
Frequent Purchases
Grocery-shopping are now centred around frequent top-up purchases through the week.
“Quick commerce has facilitated a grocery shopping habit which already existed – more frequent purchases. These companies are now also looking to improve profitability by expanding into higher-margin and impulse-driven categories,” said Devangshu Dutta, founder and CEO of Third Eyesight, a consultancy in consumer space.
While the channel is already significant for FMCG companies in the top 8-10 cities, it is expanding rapidly into smaller towns as operators such as Blinkit, Zepto and Swiggy Instamart widen their footprint.
Premium Push
The channel has also allowed companies to push premium products, executives said.
“While on marketplaces and traditional e-commerce platforms we were heavily skewed towards staples, the shift to q-commerce is helping us premiumise our assortment and sell far more indulgent categories,” Britannia Industries chief commercial officer Vipin Kataria told analysts earlier this month.
The transition has led to a threefold increase in sales of adjacency categories for the biscuits and dairy products maker, he said.
Kataria expects quick commerce’s contribution to the company’s total online sales to rise to 85% from 70% currently.
Most FMCG companies reported 70-100% year-on-year growth in quick commerce sales in FY26, making it the fastest-growing channel for the industry for the past two to three years. Executives expect the trend to continue.
Dabur India global chief executive officer Mohit Malhotra said beverages, foods, personal care and home care are currently the strongest-performing categories in this channel.
Saugata Gupta, managing director of Marico, said quick commerce is likely to be especially dominant in foods, while specialised ecommerce players such as Myntra and Nykaa remain strong in personal care.
The maker of Parachute, Saffola and Livon brands is strengthening its quick commerce supply chain through digitisation, automation and AI-based forecasting, Gupta said.
(Published in Economic Times)
admin
February 2, 2026
Sakshi Sadashiv, MINT
Bengaluru, 02 Feb 2026
BRND.ME, a roll-up commerce company, expects to complete its reverse flip (change of headquarters) from Singapore to India by March, clearing a key regulatory hurdle as it prepares to tap Indian public markets with an IPO.
Despite the rise of private labels from quick-commerce giants such as Swiggy Instamart and Zepto, CEO Ananth Narayanan remains confident. He argues that BRND.ME’s core categories—spanning complex, value-added products such as specialized haircare and niche party supplies—possess a level of brand loyalty and complexity that is difficult for generic retail labels to replicate. While private labels are currently displacing national brands in high-frequency, simple categories like dairy and staples, Narayanan believes the company’s core categories remain protected from this encroachment as they drive searches.
Having shifted its strategy from aggressive acquisitions to organic scaling, the company is now doubling down on its four largest brands: MyFitness (peanut butter), Botanic Hearth (haircare), Majestic Pure (aromatherapy), and PartyPropz (celebration supplies).
About 10-15% of BRND.ME’s India business currently comes from quick commerce, a channel the company plans to scale, Narayanan said. The company is the leader in party supplies on quick-commerce platforms, benefiting from impulse-driven demand. “People forget birthdays and anniversaries, so it’s a classic category to build a brand on quick commerce,” he said. The category contributes about ₹200 crore of revenue. The company also leads the peanut butter category through MyFitness, with a 30% market share on all quick commerce platforms and annual revenue of ₹270 crore.
The company’s revenue run rate stands at about $200 million. Male consumers worried about male-pattern baldness now account for about 35% of haircare sales. The company aims for a 10-fold jump in aromatherapy and haircare sales from $6 million to $60 million within four years, led by Majestic Pure and Botanic Hearth.
Drawing on his experience running Myntra, Narayanan said that private labels typically have a ceiling. “Even when we pushed hard on private labels at Myntra, they never went beyond 25-30% of the overall portfolio. That tends to remain the case as the categories we operate in are very hard to displace because we drive searches.”
This dynamic is already visible across several quick-commerce categories. The peanut butter segment is heavily consolidated on Blinkit, with Pintola and MyFitness together accounting for about 73% of sales, according to data from Datum Intelligence. Similar patterns have emerged in other categories. Blinkit’s popcorn segment, for instance, has rapidly consolidated into a duopoly, with 4700BC and Act II controlling 99% of sales.
Private labels muscling in
While Blinkit has consciously avoided launching private-label products on its platform, Swiggy has done so through Noice, and Zepto through Relish and Daily Good. For established brands, these private labels are becoming harder to ignore. Swiggy has scaled Noice aggressively, expanding the portfolio from about 200 to 350 stock keeping units (SKUs) and onboarding more manufacturing partners while moving beyond staples into categories such as beverages and ready-to-cook foods. These products are aimed at delivering significantly higher margins of 35-40%, compared with 10-15% on third-party brands, Mint reported earlier.
Private labels now contribute an estimated 6-8% of quick-commerce sales, up from 1-2% two years ago, according to data from 1digitalstack.ai, though penetration in perishables remains limited because of supply-chain complexity and quality concerns. A broader push into fresh categories could lift private-label share to 10-15%. Noice has already captured 3.4% of wafer sales and 1.9% of biscuit sales on the platform within months of its launch, according to 1digitalstack.ai data. The two categories are dominated by Lay’s and Britannia, which have a market share of about 35% each in their respective segments.
Zepto’s private-label push spans multiple everyday categories, including Relish for meat products, Daily Good for staples, Chyll for ice cubes and juices, and Aaha! for snacks, sweets, cereals and batters.
This growing presence creates a structural ‘trap’ for digital-first brands. Devangshu Dutta, chief executive at Third Eyesight, a consultancy firm, said, “Brands that are overly dependent on a single sales platform remain structurally vulnerable to being replaced by the platform’s own private labels, which are designed to capitalise on product opportunities that already have proven demand.” Platforms, he explained, tend to dominate high-frequency purchases, often undercutting brands on both price and visibility.
Persistently high online customer acquisition costs add to the pressure, particularly if the customer relationship is owned by the platform rather than the brand. “This has been one of the significant friction points for all digital-only brands, and weighs especially heavily on companies that have online-heavy portfolios with multiple brands in play,” Dutta added.
(Published in Mint)
