- Baba Ramdev owned Patanjali Ayurved has lost significant market shares in nearly all categories but toothpaste held its market after a sharp consumer shift towards natural products which shows its rise as rivals to other toothpaste brands.
- In key categories such as detergents, hair care, soaps, and noodles market shares of Patanjali Ayurved in the year to July were lower than in the year-ago period as per the latest Nielsen data.
The latest data on consumer goods show that Baba Ramdev owned Patanjali Ayurved has lost significant market shares in nearly all categories but toothpaste held its market after a sharp consumer shift towards natural products which shows its rise as rivals to other toothpaste brands.
In key categories such as detergents, hair care, soaps, and noodles market shares of Patanjali Ayurved in the year to July were lower than in the year-ago period as per the latest Nielsen data. Patanjali which had challenged multinational’s stronghold in the FMCG sector after its launch saw an overall sales decline in financial year 18-19.
The reason behind the slow down is the trade disruptions caused by demonetization and then GST two years ago and then strong competition from large companies who shored up their portfolio with own ayurvedic offerings.
“They faced distribution turmoil soon after GST as they were not equipped with handling return of goods. Also, many companies launched natural variants as well as matched prices, which impacted Patanjali, which had limited distribution network compared to established firms,” said Abneesh Roy, executive vice-president of institutional equities, at Edelweiss Research.
A recent report by Kantar said, About 60% of all new launches in 2018 were in the natural space, a 49% jump from two years ago.
Currently, Patanjali has more than 200,000 sales counter and about 100 Patanjali mega stores. Apart from this, it has its own online sale portal and more than 1,500 Patanjali Chikitsalayas (hospitals), 5,000 Arogya Centers (Healing Centers), and 25,000 swadeshi centers.
Patanjali started off as a small pharmacy in 1997 and launched more than two dozen mainstream FMCG products ranging from shampoos, toothpaste, and other personal care products to modern convenience foods such as cornflakes and instant noodles and recorded sales of Rs. 10,500 crore by 2017.
Source- Patanjali Website
Although, the sales fell to 10 percent to Rs. 8,135 crore in the year to March 2018, while it registered sales of Rs. 4,701 crore in first nine months of Financial Year 2019 as per the provisional data by CARE Ratings.
Big multinational FMCGs such as market leader Hindustan Unilever has relaunched the Lever Ayush Brand of ayurvedic personal care products, acquired Indulekha Hair Care brand, and launched Citra skincare brand to spruce up its presence in the naturals space.
Patanjali was established in 2006 by Baba Ramdev and Acharya Balkrishna in order to promote Ayurveda. The company declared its annual turnover of the year 2016-17 to be estimated ₹10,216 crores (US$1.5 billion). It was listed 13th in the list of India’s most trusted brands (The Brand Trust Report) as of 2018 and ranks first in FMCG category.
As per the report of Credit Sussie, FMCG Sector slow down started back in 2016 but it was hidden due to different issues. The report clearly pointed out that the slowdown in growth started in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2018-2019.
