One important trend within the batteries category is that consumers are increasingly and continuously seeking value for money.
This results in people looking for larger, more economic pack sizes.
Advanced Power Solutions NV is responding to this trend by launching larger battery pack sizes.
The company has seen a continued growth in sales for both regular Alkaline batteries and Lithium button cells.
Its best-selling products are the whole Zinc Carbon Range as well as the Alkaline value-for-money range. Alkaline Power and Everyday Power are also performing well in the market. These are products focused on low-drain appliances such as wall clocks, scales & TV remote controls which are the appliances most batteries are being bought for.
For high drain appliances, Panasonic presents EVOLTA, a dedicated range with exceptional performance in low, middle and high drain products, that outperforms all competitors’ products – which makes it the ideal battery for heavy-use kids toys.
“We are focusing more on sustainability,” says Vicky Raman, Brand Marketing Manager, Advanced Power Solutions NV. “A part of our production is manufactured in Belgium to reduce transport-related carbon emissions and they are produced in a CO2 neutral production unit. We are working on reducing plastic usage in our packaging and we are launching larger battery pack sizes in response to consumers’ demand for even better value for money and economy packs. We are also in the process of re-evaluating and optimising the way our displays function. These new displays will also be implemented on retailer level.”
For the rest of the year 2021 Advanced Power Solutions has a partnership with Hasbro’s Power Rangers in a Europe-wide campaign, including Special Edition Power Rangers Battery Packs. People are invited to try out the game and have a chance to win an exclusive spot in the Power Rangers karate bootcamp in an online competition.
The competition is supported with a dedicated website and in-store displays around the company’s whole retail network.
The exclusive on-pack promotion is designed to engage with core battery users of families with kids. In order to maximise the sales pulling power for retailers the packs are also available with an extra free batteries promotion.
Until the end of December, each month offers participants a new chance to win special Power Rangers prizes as well as Panasonic batteries. The main prize winners will dive into the action-packed universe of Power Rangers with an exclusive 4-day Power Rangers Karate Boot Camp on a secret location – all flights and accommodation included.
In addition to the Power Rangers partnership, Advanced Power Solutions has presented stores with new displays and seasonally themed clip strips to maximise visibility.
“We learned during the Pandemic that batteries are an essential product as numerous families had to stay home and had to find some kind some kind of in-home entertainment to keep the children busy,” adds Raman. “So as a battery brand, we have benefited from the pandemic in 2020, the brand is en route for further success in 2021 as Panasonic has gained new high profile listings in Tesco, as part of its ongoing strategy to expand its UK customer base.”
Private label batteries increased in value sales +12% in the last 26 weeks according to IRI. All grocers experienced uplifts to varying degrees. We have also seen changes across battery type growth. Over the last few years, the strongest growth has come from Lithium Coins as devices get smaller and lithium is a more powerful technology.
However, during the pandemic, traditional Alkaline batteries have had the strongest growth as they are the most used in our households. Devices that are consuming AA and AAA batteries had the highest consumption: they represent 90% of the market according to the latest Nielsen data.
“This is not surprising given that ‘on-the-go’ is a thing of the past and consumers have had to adapt to the ‘new normal’ of staying in more,” comments Raman. “It will be interesting to see how things develop post-corona, as social life recovers and so many more people are aware of the importance of having batteries around. During lockdown, people spent a lot of time in their homes and increasingly engaged in activities that required battery usage. This helped to stimulate battery sales and increased consumption contributed to the category delivering bumper growth in 2020. As the nation emerges from lockdown batteries will still remain a highly important and profitable category for retailers.”
Siem Los, Marketing Manager UK & Ireland at Duracell, comments: “The battery category is a constantly evolving category driven by device innovation. It is one of our key objectives to support our customers in the best possible way to drive growth by investing into the category and enable them to have the right assortment.”
Duracell offers a wide portfolio with a strong focus on innovation in alkaline and specialty.
Duracell Plus, the UK’s best-selling battery, has been relaunched with premium performance through a new and improved formula.
The core of the company’s assortment is and for the upcoming years will be alkaline, but it is seeing strong year on year growth in the Specialty segment as well. Driven by the Internet of Things trend, Duracell sees a significant rise of smaller interconnected smart devices that drive 2032 and 2025 sales continuously.
Covid has resulted in significant growth in the battery category with growth up to 9% full year. This is primarily driven by an increased use of devices at home such as game controllers (+16%), remotes (+22%), and wireless mouses (+14%).
Duracell has regularly surveyed a panel of 3,000 UK consumers to better understand their buying and consumption behaviours.
Quite soon it became clear that consumers’ loyalty towards their favourite premium brands has grown during Covid.
Consumers also shopped less frequently, but bought significantly more, impacting the sales of bigger and higher value packs. Even though consumers shopped bigger packs, this still resulted in immediate use rather than potential stock-up. 2020 was a record year for Duracell.
“Christmas is the make-or-break period in the year,” says Los. “With 35% of the volume being sold in the last 2 months of the year we expect especially this year with increased device penetration that we will have a strong market.”
Duracell is investing significantly in innovation around Specialty Batteries.
Apart from product performance upgrades Child Safety is a top priority. Duracell is the market leader in product innovations that prevent toddlers to ingest lithium coin batteries with tamper proof packaging and Bittrex coating on the cell.
f “The Duracell brand is our most valuable asset that we support full year,” adds Los. “We support our brand through TV advertising and digital media to drive our awareness and equity. As market leader we see our role to invest as much into the category as possible. Driving sustainable growth is only possible with the right level of media support.”
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