Mondelez, maker of Cadbury chocolates, on Tuesday announced its entry into ₹2,000 crore packaged cakes market as the maker of Oreo cookies and Bournvita health drink expects in-home consumption of snacking to accelerate given the covid-19 pandemic is pushing Indian households to stock up more on small indulgences.
Cadbury Chocobakes, priced at ₹10 and ₹60 for a single and multi-pack, respectively will be available on Grofers and rolled out across modern and general trade, said Sudhanshu Nagpal, Associate Director, marketing (biscuits), Mondelez.
Mondelez, a late entrant in the country’s biscuit market has slowly built a biscuit portfolio with its launch of more premium Oreos in 2011, and subsequently with Bournvita biscuits in 2016.
Nagpal said the company has kept its launch of the new category, Chocobakes cakes, intact—given that consumers staying indoors have drummed up demand for packaged snacks among them—biscuits and noodles.
“We continue to be bullish about the snacking opportunity. The importance of snacking will go up as consumers spend more time indoors and be more cautious of what they are putting in their mouth," Nagpal said.
Since March-end, biscuits have seen a strong off-take said Nagpal, corroborating demand trends seen by rival Britannia and Parle that reported record spike in sale of their biscuit brands.
Overall, the fast moving consumer goods market is expected to grow at a sluggish pace of 5-6% during the current year, except for some essentials.
"We decided we will not hold back on our plans and further step the pedal to ensure right snacks reach the consumers, " said Nagpal, adding that demand is gradually coming back.
Mondelez plans to capitalize on this demand for snacking.
"We are going back in the investment mode. All our brands are back on air and we will make big moves as we go along with a select few launches."
Rival Britannia Industries, too, sold more packs of biscuits in April and May, posting a 20% and 28% growth in sales, respectively.
On Tuesday, Vinay Subramanyam, Head of Marketing, Britannia Industries said its popular brand Marie Gold grew "leaps and bounds".
The brand’s marketing plans and launches for the year are intact, said Subramanian.
"We don’t want to pause our plans i.e. through ads on television and digital."
He said Britannia has not cut back massively on advertising, “we are in the essentials kind of range. Marie as a brand, is among the fastest growing brands in this pandemic among our stable of brands. It has been been fairly recession proof and fastest of the block."
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_1566901919774_1566901920225.jpg "Kartik Aaryan, the new brand ambassador of Cadbury Dairy Milk Silk, made his acting debut in 2011 with 'Pyaar Ka Punchnama'.")
