São Paulo – Sales at Brazilian supermarkets were up 2.24% in 2014 from 2013, according results released this Tuesday (27) by the Brazilian Supermarkets Association (Abras). It was the weakest performance since 2006, when sales declined by 1.59%.
Year-on-year in December, sales were up 2.94%. In December from November, sales increased by 20.62%.
Abras chairman Fernando Yamada believes growth was enabled by low unemployment. The performance fell a bit short from the organization’s earlier 3% growth projections. “Even though sales grew less than they did in 2013, the results in 2014 were positive, and more so considering the overall performance of Brazilian economy,” he said.
In 2015, Abras forecasts 2% growth. Yamada pondered that the outlook is an optimistic one, and might be revised in case economic indicators should plummet. “If the indicators are anything to go by, unemployment will stay within the range we deem positive, at 5.7%. As long as income levels don’t drop any further, we will maintain our estimate,” he stressed.
Supermarkets are expected to keep performing satisfactorily in segments such as food, beverages, hygiene and beauty. “There is a heavy leaning towards products that bring personal satisfaction,” said Fábio Gomes da Silva, the Front Office manager for Nielsen, a consultancy providing services to Abras.
According to him, part of the population tends to continue to buy at supermarkets to make up for the lowering of standards in other consumption forms. “Whenever people go into debt, [whenever] there is inflationary pressure and an interest rate hike, if they need to let go of things, they will stop buying out of home. And that brings people into supermarkets.”
In 2013, the industry grossed R$ 272.2 billion in revenues. The 84,000 existing supermarkets in Brazil employ roughly 1.7 million people.
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum
