Magazine: Major sporting events can drive snack sales this summer

The summer of 2016 can be a peak period in snack sales: in football there is going to be the Euro 2016 with the participation of the Hungarian national team, followed by the Olympic Games in Rio.

Barnabás Kovács, brand manager of Fővárosi Ásványvíz- és Üdítőipari Zrt. told us that during the 2014 football World Cup (June-July) sales were 17 percent higher than in the preceding two months. No wonder that the company decided to start sponsoring the UEFA Champions League in 2015: football is a platform that can easily connect to eating crisps. Mr Kovács informed that the driving force behind their two-digit value sales growth were various nuts and potato crisps. The company is present with Lay’s products in the potato crisp market and with Cheetos in the extruded crisp segment.

From retail channels hyper- and supermarkets were very important but in 2015 local chains managed to increase sales considerably. New product launches also drove market sales; the company’s experience is that consumers like to try new flavours. In the last 3 years the Lay’s brand strengthened very much, thanks to successful innovations and regular communication. One of the key steps was putting the Lay’s Strong sub-brand on the market, because Hungarian consumers love hot, spicy flavours such as Lay’s Strong Spicy-Curry, Jalapeno&Cheese, Chilli&Lime, Wasabi and Piri Piri Chilli. In January 2016 the company appeared with two new products on store shelves: hot Brazilian Salsa and piquant Venice Pepperoni.

New market players are appearing on the snack scene such as Detki Keksz Kft., which in the past only manufactured sweet biscuits. Managing director Olga Pavlova told us that the crackers they manufacture for children contain no flavour enhancers and colouring agents, and the potato crisps they make are oven-baked, so their fat content is much lower than ordinary products’. The company’s new salty range consists of 8 products. This year they don’t intend to come out with more snack products, but in the sweet biscuit category they plan to introduce new products.

Besides salty snacks, consumers can also choose from a wide range of sweet snacks, nuts and dried fruits, which is really good news to those who are looking for a bit healthier snack solutions. Rita Lovász, marketing director of Gilan Trading Kft. told Trade magazin that the dried fruit and nut market has been developing dynamically in the last 10 years, and from this trend Kalifa products profited as well. There are two high seasons in dried fruit sales every year, the October-December period and the weeks before Easter. In nut sales summer sporting events are of special importance. A wide range of Kalifa products are available in shops, in many different sizes.

Tamás Mezei, quality assurance director of Natur-Food Kft. is of the opinion that the paleo and vegetarian diets, plus the growing number of consumers living with gluten-sensitivity have a positive influence on nut, dried fruit and natural snack sales. In 2015 the company’s sales augmented in both the sweet and the natural snack markets. In the last few years the company made progress in many fields, building a new production facility and installing new production lines. They had the packaging of many products redesigned to meet current trends and consumer expectations better.

Nobilis specialises in fruit-based snacks and managing director Krisztina Koncz told our magazine that there has been a palpable growth in demand for healthy food all over the world. People live longer than they used to and if they want to preserve the quality of their life, they have to pay greater attention to what they eat. In its innovation activity the company focuses on manufacturing products with high added value – basically functional food with local traditions such as dried apple, sour cherry and plum, walnut, squash and acacia honey coming from those regions in Hungary where they are produced the best.