Can Black Friday and end-of-year sales make those figures positive again?

Enjoying a refreshing drink on a sunny terrace and eating a healthy lunch in the restaurant has been a dream for so long since the forced restaurant closure as of October 2020. Since then, we’ve witnessed a huge increase in the kitchen appliances categories such as food preparation, deep fryers, and hot beverage makers. Most of those appliances, such as kitchen machines, now know a heavy downturn due to the fact of the restaurant re-opening in May 2021. And during summer the situation has not improved at all. In Q3 2021 we noticed a decline in the kitchen appliances segment of -8% in value while the same quarter last year we constated an absolute milestone in sales with +26%. Although the market has witnessed a downfall in 2021, the figures remain much higher than in 2019, meaning that the interest of the consumer in preparing delicious meals at home is still of importance.

In terms of cooking appliances, we can conclude that there has been a huge reverse trend in comparison to the 2020 figures. In contrast, however, with hot beverage makers appliances remain growing with +3% (value) in Q3. Fully automatic and espresso pump traditional machines are still not over the expanding trend yet, which has been extra stimulated given the fact that several ‘work from home office days’ have been implemented in various companies. When working from home, you would also like to enjoy a good cup of coffee during working hours. Covid-19 resulted in an overall uplift of the hot beverage makers category but as expected there’s an underlying trend to switch from all types of filter coffee machines to espresso appliances, making the latter segment grow exceptionally well. This has not only been shown in the machine sales in our POS data but also in the purchase behavior of coffee beans & pods within GfK Consumer Panel studies. The coffee study on beans, pods, pads…has shown that the category growth on espresso machines is much larger than filter coffee. But more important than in terms of cannibalization, we’ve witnessed no more growth for instant filter coffee. Meaning that the downwards trend we have spotted in filter coffee over the past years will eventually come back.

Now with the end-of-year and Black Friday sales insight let’s hope that the positive figures in hot beverage makers can continue in Q4. In terms of cooking appliances, we shall see if there’s an uplift within certain categories. Especially in fun cooking, we suspect that the trend will remain like previous years. Fondue, hot stone, raclette, and many more benefit from their popularity during end-of-year sales, making it the star category of Black Friday in 2020. In Q3 the product group knew a decline of -5% (value) but let’s assume that the Belgian consumer would still need its fun cooking appliances to have a good end-of-year celebration in 2021.