Data Highlights: Top Brands in Africa

Despite talk of a growing consumer class and increase in the prominence of local African brands, this year’s ranking had the lowest percent of African brands since Brand Africa’s launch in 2010, with just 13% of brands in the top 100 being from Africa. Instead, brands such as Nike and Nestlé, that are headquartered in North America and Europe, along with Asian brands including technology giants Samsung and Techno, dominated the list. Sports apparel brands and technology brands, in particular mobile phone makers, were found to be the most popular brands in Africa in 2020. Nike was the top brand for the second year, with Adidas coming in at number two and Samsung in third place.

South Africa’s telecom brand, MTN, was the highest-ranking African entry, coming in at number seven. However, in a separate prompted question that specifically asked about African brands, Nigeria’s Dangote, a leading multinational corporation with sugar, flour, and oil & gas subsidiaries, came in on top. Other African brands included Glo telecom, media company DSTV, and retail company Shoprite.

The full list of top brands in Africa is available to view here: Top 100 Brands in Africa 2020

Top FMCG brands in Africa

The Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) sector continues to grow in Africa, with global brands such as Coca-Cola investing more in the region. This year’s rankings find Coca-Cola to be the top FMCG brand in Africa, ranked number four, and competitor Pepsi comes in at number 16. Other FMCG brands in the top 100 include Danone, Unilever, and Nivea. The top three alcoholic brands were Ireland’s Guinness, followed by two local beer brands, Nigeria’s Star Beer and Kenya’s Tusker. Coca-Cola, Pepsi, and Fanta, all from the USA, are the top three non-alcoholic beverage brands, while Nestle, Dangote, and Unilever are the top three consumer, non-cyclical brands.

Top Media Brands in Africa

Given the importance of media in Africa, Brand Africa asks a specific question on top media brands in Africa. This year’s top media brands demonstrate the dominance of international news channels, with BBC, CNN, Al Jazeera, and ITV all within the top five, along with South Africa’s DSTV, which was the second most admired media brand. Social networks and websites including Facebook, YouTube, Google, and Instagram were also represented in the list of top media brands.

Top Finance Brands in Africa

The financial sector has grown enormously in Africa in the past several years, with both mobile money brands and traditional banks vying for customers. For this reason, Brand Africa also asks a specific question on top brands in the financial services sector. Unlike the top media list, which was dominated by non-African brands, the financial services list shows the prominence of local banking brands throughout Africa. Nigerian and South African services are well-represented in the top financial brands list, with Nigeria’s GTB and First Bank taking the number one and two spot, and South Africa’s ABSA and First National Bank coming in at number five and six. Togo’s Ecobank, which was ranked number one last year, was the third most popular financial brand in 2020.

Conduct Brand Research in Africa

GeoPoll conducts research for top brands throughout Africa by remote, mobile-based methods including SMS, voice call, mobile web, and mobile application. If you’re interested in conducting your own study on your brand’s health or key performance indicators, please contact us today.

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Methodology

This report is a continuation of data analysis from the same study that appears in the FMCG Purchases: Consumer Behavior in Kenya report. This study ran from March 10^th through March 16^th of 2020 via mobile web. Respondents’ answers represent purchases from the 30 days prior to survey participation. It is important to keep this fact in mind because the results of this study reflect purchasing behavior before COVID-19 related stay-at-home guidelines were released by the Government of Kenya. As the COVID-19 outbreak continues to disrupt spending patterns, this data provides a valuable baseline for FMCG purchases in Kenya.

The 400 total respondents were equally distributed among key urban centers in Kenya that are displayed in Figure 1. Each of these highlighted areas were represented by 11% of the respondent base. There was an equal split between males and females, as well as even split between three age groups: 15-24, 25-34, 35+.

Average Purchase Location for FMCG Products

As a part of this study, GeoPoll examined where FMCG products were purchased within the past 30 days. The focus of this was to determine if an item is more often purchased at retail locations that are considered a part of the formal economy or at locations that are considered part of the informal economy. For the purpose of this report, we will consider formal economy purchases to be from supermarkets and online sources. Informal economy purchases will be from dukas, kiosks, wholesalers, markets, hawkers, and “other”.

When the responses across all products were averaged by the indicated purchase location, the majority—57%—of respondents purchased FMCG products through formal retail locations: supermarkets and online. However, certain products and product categories bypass the averages seen across all products from the study. Soap purchases, for example, were mostly made in supermarkets and only a handful were made in dukas and “other” retail locations, while food and beverage purchases were made in various locations.

Purchase Location by FMCG Product Category

Food and Beverage

The variety seen in the purchase location of the food and beverage products starkly contrasts the homogenous nature of supermarket-forward purchase results for most of the other product categories: soap, dental hygiene, hair care, and cleaning products. Although there is more variety seen in the food and beverage category, supermarkets were still a frequent purchase location for many of the items. However, supermarkets were about 30% more popular on average for soap, dental hygiene, hair care and cleaning product purchases than for food and beverage purchases.

Upon a deeper look at the results, there are certain products that have purchase locations that stick out. Soda, for example, is purchased at dukas 16% more than at grocery stores and 33% more than at kiosks, meaning that the majority of soda purchases are occurring in convenient locations like in dukas and kiosks, rather than supermarkets that tend to be more siloed from foot traffic. This is unique even in the beverage category alone, seeing as soda is the only beverage that was purchased more at dukas and kiosks than at supermarkets. For beverage manufacturers, this shows that the majority of the urban Kenyan market for soda retail distribution lives in the informal economy, while other beverage sales (juice, water, liquor, wine, and beer) live more in the formal economy.

As for food products, produce, grains, and beans are more often purchased locally at marketplaces than in supermarkets. The prevalence of produce, grains, and beans in the informal economy is not particularly surprising when the prevalence of smallholder farmers in the area is considered.

Beauty Products

Aside from food and beverages, the other FMCG product category with notable variations in the purchase location was beauty products. Although supermarkets were the most popular purchase location for each of the beauty products, what stood out against all of the other product categories was the high rate of online purchases. An average of only 3% of all of the other FMCG products in this study were purchased online, yet an average of 13% of the products in the beauty product category were purchased online. This may be due to a variety of reasons. For the purpose of this report, however, it is most notable that the beauty products in this study fell into the formal economy more often than the informal economy.

Formal vs. informal economy in Kenya: key takeaways

For the FMCG products included in this study, the majority of purchases on average occurred through formal retail avenues. The informal retail space was most notably seen for soda purchases and natural foods like produce, grains, and beans.

To conduct further research on this topic or one similar, contact us today to learn more about GeoPoll’s capabilities.

Image attribution

Hawker left, hawker right , kiosk , duka , wholesaler, image of a market

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The promise seen in the consumer goods sector in Kenya has not gone unnoticed. GeoPoll has previously conducted research on the FMCG market in Kenya and so have other organizations; however, there is not much publicly available knowledge on the key drivers influencing purchasing decisions for Kenyans in the FMCG space. For this reason, GeoPoll set out to add more data to the conversation. This post will present our findings from a recent study on what FMCG products consumers are purchasing most often and what factors are guiding the related purchase decisions.

Methodology

This study ran from March 10^th through March 16^th of 2020 via mobile web. Respondents’ answers represent purchases from the 30 days prior to survey participation. It is important to keep this fact in mind because the results of this study reflect purchasing behavior before COVID-19 related stay-at-home guidelines were released by the Government of Kenya. As the COVID-19 outbreak continues to disrupt spending patterns, this data provides a valuable baseline for FMCG purchases in Kenya.

The 400 total respondents were equally distributed among key urban centers in Kenya that are displayed in Figure 1. Each of these highlighted areas were represented by 11% of the respondent base. There was an equal split between males and females, as well as even split between three age groups: 15-24, 25-34, 35+.

Kenyan’s FMCG purchases from the past 30 days

The questionnaire began by inquiring about which products respondents purchased within the past 30 days. Respondents indicated from a list of over 30 products what they had purchased. 

Each item in the chart to the left shows the percentage of respondents that indicated purchasing the labeled item within the past 30 days. The top five most purchased items—toothpaste, bread, laundry soap, body soap, and meat—saw only minor change when analyzed by demographic. Toothpaste remained the number one most purchased item for all age groups and both gender groups. The remaining top 5 products saw slight variation in order of popularity across the same groups. The only change in the top 5 for age or gender was in the female demographic. The top 5 most purchased items for females included toilet cleaner rather than meat like the other demographic groups. The charts below outline the unique rankings for the top five products across all of the age groups and genders.

Key Influences of FMCG Purchases

In past studies on Kenyan consumer behavior, it has been found that consumers are price-aware and brand loyal, yet tend to justify paying higher prices in exchange for quality products. The data collected in this study generally reflects such findings.

Overall, quality was by far the most important aspect that influenced the respondent’s purchase decisions, followed by brand, and then price. For every category other than beverages, quality significantly outweighed brand or price by about 20%. These results clearly show that a very large portion of urban Kenyan consumers are quality-focused when purchasing FMCG products.

When the results are looked at beyond quality-focused results, it is apparent that there is a subset of brand-loyal consumers also in the space. Over 40% of respondents are driven by brand name more than any of the other purchasing considerations when making beverage purchases. The beverage category was the only FMCG category to receive this brand-focused response; however, brand was the second most important factor for dental hygiene, hair care, cleaning, and beauty products. It is hard to say exactly why this occurred without further research, but our findings do align with what has been found in other studies where Kenyans showed brand-loyal tendencies.

Price was also a notable consideration made by respondents. Specifically, food and soap were the most price-sensitive categories, yet 15% or more of the respondents in every category indicated that price was the most important factor that they considered when making purchases. This finding also aligns in-part with other findings that Kenyan consumers are price-aware, yet this study emphasizes that quality and brand name are generally more important to these consumers, at least for FMCG purchases.

All in all, consumer’s purchasing decisions are complex, built by a multitude of nuanced psychological associations between a product and its price, brand, quality, convenience, packaging, and more. In order to draw specific conclusions, we would need to know more about how quality, brand name, price, etc. are used to drive purchasing decisions. What the results from this study can tell us though is that Kenyan consumers are interested in quality, brand, and price of FMCG products, more than convenience, packaging, or other factors. This takeaway is a great first step in understanding what a company may need to do to prepare a product for success in the Kenyan FMCG market.

If your organization would like to dig deeper into this topic or others, GeoPoll can help. Contact us today to learn more about our capabilities and expertise.

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In order to examine how consumers are planning for 2019’s holiday season, GeoPoll conducted our annual holiday season survey in Kenya, Ghana, and South Africa. The survey was administered by SMS in October 2019. Findings demonstrate how consumers are planning for the holidays, what they feel about their country’s economy and their own personal finances, and whether they see advertisements as an important factor in making holiday purchasing decisions.

See a dashboard of key results below and further analysis below. Contact us if you’re interested in purchasing the full dataset.

Perceptions of the Economy in Ghana, Kenya, and South Africa

Results around personal financial stability and perceptions towards each country’s economy show the disparity between different segments of the population; While levels of personal financial stability are relatively split between moderately stable, somewhat stable, and not stable at all, overall respondents rate their economies as either average or poor, with just 12% in Ghana, 4% in Kenya, and 14% in South Africa rating their country’s economy as either good or excellent.

In Kenya and South Africa, a higher percentage reported being not stable financially compared to 2018; In Kenya, 35% reported being not stable, compared to 31% in 2018, and in South Africa 27% reported being not stable financially in 2019, versus 21% who said the same in 2018. In Ghana, however, the percent who are not stable financially decreased from 24% in 2018 to 19% in 2019.

Despite the fact that respondents were unlikely to report being very stable financially, most respondents still predict that their holiday spending will increase this year compared to last year.  In Ghana and Kenya, 43% and 42% respectively reported that their holiday spending will increase, in line with the percentage who reported the same in 2018. Only in South Africa do more respondents believe their holiday spending will decrease than increase; 33% expect their spending to increase, while 39% expect it to decrease.

When we examined why holiday spending may decrease this year, we found making less money and having less savings to be the most-cited reasons across countries, although in Ghana and South Africa respondents were more likely to have less savings, while in Kenya a higher percentage of respondents (47%) report making less money than those who have less savings (39%). For those who expect their holiday spending to increase this year, the most common reason was items being more expensive in Ghana and Kenya, while in South Africa the largest portion of those who expect their spending to increase cited having more savings to spend on the holidays.

In terms of where they expect to get money for holiday spending, the largest group of respondents in each country, 36% overall, plan to use savings, while working more jobs (30%) and reducing other spending (26%) were the second and third most common options.

Africa Holiday Shopping Predictions for 2019

Despite reports of online shopping growing throughout sub-Saharan Africa, including around holiday events such as Black Friday, our study finds that most holiday shopping is still done offline. Overall just 12% report that they will do most of their shopping online, with the highest online shopping numbers being in Ghana, where 14% report that they will shop mostly online, and the lowest in South Africa. While certain purchases may be made online, we find that local markets are the most popular place for holiday shopping in Kenya and Ghana, at 57% each, while in South Africa responses are more split between supermarkets (39%), local markets (27%), and chain retail store (27%).

We also examined the factors that contribute to making holiday purchase decisions, finding that although financial stability is moderate to low, product quality remains a priority over product price. Overall 41% list price as an attribute that is important to them when shopping for others over the holidays, while 52% list quality as an important attribute. Brand name is a less important factor, with only 9% listing this as a consideration when shopping.

While gift purchases are often a focus of retailers around the holidays, GeoPoll’s study finds that the majority of money spent around the holidays goes towards food and drink for entertaining, rather than gifts for others or themselves, general socializing, or travel expenses. Overall 42% report spending the most on supplies for entertaining, with this number being highest in South Africa, at 48%. Ghanaians are the most likely to spend the majority of their money on gifts for traveling, while South Africans also are more likely to spend on travel.

The Impact of Advertisements on Holiday Spending

Advertising spend increases globally around the holidays, and digital media in particular been growing as an important source for retailers looking to reach their target audiences with news of sales and product announcements. Digital ad spend has been increasing not only in the US, where $6 billion was spent over the period from Black Friday to Cyber Monday, but also in Africa and the Middle East, where expenditures on social media and other digital advertising channels are increasing.

To find out the impact of all these advertisements on consumers, we asked respondents how often they pay attention to product advertisements when looking for holiday gifts, finding that most respondents, 37% ‘sometimes’ pay attention to advertisements. Overall 22% report that they always pay attention to advertisements for holiday spending, with the highest proportion of those respondents coming from South Africa and the lowest from Ghana, while 17% say they often pay attention. A combined total of 24% say they never or rarely pay attention to advertisements, demonstrating that more people are paying some attention to advertisements than those who do not take them into account at all while shopping.

Illustrating the growing importance of digital media, we find that social media is a strong second behind TV as the biggest source of advertisements for holiday products: While 35% say they most often see holiday ads on TV, 29% report that social media platforms are the biggest source of holiday advertisements and 9% report that they most often see ads on online news sites. Radio, traditionally one of the widest-reaching mediums for advertisements in Africa, was listed by only 12% as the medium where they most often see holiday advertisements.

Gather Data on Holiday Plans with GeoPoll

Using GeoPoll’s database of respondents throughout emerging markets and mobile survey platform, you can conduct custom research on how consumers plan to shop and entertain this holiday season. In addition, GeoPoll Audience Measurement provides advertisers with the most up to date data available on the best timeslots to reach your target audience. If you’re interested in conducting your own research with GeoPoll, please contact us today.

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The hyper-competitive world of fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) —goods that are easily produced, packaged, sold, and consumed (i.e., food, beverages, snacks, toiletries, etc.) — relies on narrow profit margins, competitive branding, and global reach. Since most FMCG companies produce and ship similar products, the majority of their profit margin is driven by either branding or scope.

For many companies, the latter (scope) is one of the quickest and most viable ways to boost profit lines without significant infrastructure or marketing investments. But, as globalization takes heed and new, fresh markets are slowly dripping away, trying to position your products to new customers can be difficult.

Today, we’re going to look at how FMCG brands fare in the African market and why it may be the most significant driver of international FMCG profits in the coming years.

Understanding the African FMCG Market

For an FMCG brand to thrive in a region, it must have one or more of the following key attributes.

1. A dense population
2. The spending power to purchase cheap goods
3. An understanding of their brand competition
4. Supporting infrastructure to facilitate sales

Looking at Africa as a region for FMCG investment, it’s crucial that we take these attributes into account.

Africa’s Population Density and Infrastructure

Since FMCG brands operate on a narrow profit margin, they rely on heavy consumption to turn a profit. This means that any FMCG brand is going to need to know that they are expanding to an area that’s both growing and dense enough to accommodate their products.

According to McKinsey, by 2025 Africa is expected to have over 100 cities of 1 million or more people, and by 2030 Africa’s population (currently estimated at 1.1 billion) will double, with 80% of that growth happening in cities. While Africa, as a whole, is still a more rural continent than North America, Latin America, and Europe, as youth move out of the countryside and into cities, many countries in Africa are becoming increasingly urbanized. This is especially the case in cities like Lagos, whose population has increased by 100X since the 1960s and is expected to become the world’s largest metro area by 2100.

From these figures it is clear that urbanization is on the rise in Africa, and therefore zones of urban consumption are rising heavily across Africa.

Africa’s Spending Power

Africa is in a prime position to dominate the FMCG market: 2/3 of Africa’s $1.4 trillion retail spending in 2016 was on FMCG goods – which dominate almost all of Africa’s household expenses. In addition, with the Economist Intelligence Unit expects this FMCG spending will continue and increase in viability through 2030, and Africa is probably the single most profitable sector for FMCG spending expansion bar East Asia.

Now, let’s look at branding competition, which can be extremely difficult to measure. The first, and most complicated, issue to note is the dominance of informal outlets for consumer goods in Africa. In fact, Africa’s speedy growth in the FMCG area is far higher than predicted, since most FMCG spending still occurs in informal settings which can be extremely difficult to measure using traditional research methods. This presents both a challenge and an opportunity for FMCG brands. The challenge is that brands must overcome significant infrastructure and bureaucratic barriers to create a significant brand presence in Africa. However, if brands are able to successfully root themselves in the African market, there are opportunities to build strong brand loyalty, as competition is often thinner than in more developed markets.

One example of this is the alcoholic beverage industry in Africa, which has recently been rising. Local authorities in Nigeria have been removing many local breweries and home-grown liquor producers from the supply source of Africa over the last few years, and because of this, Nigerian Breweries and Guinness Nigeria have been able to dominate the market with a combined market capitalization of over $8.4 trillion. Across the continent, multinationals including SABMiller, Diageo, and Heineken have been making large investments into growing their African portfolios, and are now some of the highest valued corporations in markets such as Kenya.

FMCG Research in Africa

Infrastructure and regulatory barriers, along with a lack of information on brand loyalty, product preference, and consumption through informal markets are friction points for introducing FMCG goods into the market, but when overcome brands can build strong customer bases in areas with little competition. While it has traditionally been difficult to gather up-to-date research on FMCG goods consumption and brand affinity in Africa, using GeoPoll’s mobile survey methods it is possible to gather accurate data on the FMCG market throughout the continent.

GeoPoll works with leading FMCG brands to help them track product and brand preference, test new concepts or marketing messaging, and much more. In addition, GeoPoll can reach market traders in order to gather data on the informal trade markets that make up a large portion of African spending. Africa already has dense urban populations and a growing consumer class, and by leveraging GeoPoll’s market research services FMCG brands can gather the information they need to make informed decisions regarding their growth. If your brand is interested in exploring expansion in Africa, please contact us today to learn how we can help you explore growth throughout East, West, and Southern Africa.

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GeoPoll surveyed over 500 respondents per country in Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa over just one day in January 2016. Here is what we found:

Views on the economy
As the below chart shows, countries are split on performance of their economies in the past 90 days. In both Kenya and Nigeria, people’s perceptions of the economy have improved since 2014.

A majority of respondents in each country believe the economy will improve in the next 90 days.

In every country, we find a majority of respondents are spending more this year than last year.

Shopping habits
GeoPoll also examined shopping habits in each country, asking respondents where they shopped most recently, what products they bought, and if they have a preference in buying locally made or imported products.

We found that there are differences in shopping location by country. In Kenya, 64% went shopping last weekend and the majority of those (56%) went to a supermarket, with 35% shopping at a local kiosk. In Nigeria, of the 61% who went shopping last weekend 47% went to a supermarket, 29% to a local kiosk, and 11% to a mall.  In South Africa, 68% went shopping last weekend, and there was a notable difference in shopping location, with 60% going to a mall, 33% to a supermarket, and just 4% to a local kiosk.

Products bought also differed by country, as illustrated in the chart below. Kenyans were more likely to purchase food, while Nigerians and South Africans purchased clothes and cosmetics more often than Kenyans.

GeoPoll also found a strong preference in all three countries for locally made products.  In each country, over half of respondents reported buying local products last weekend.  All respondents were asked about their preferred product origins, with results in the chart below:

Product Availability and Cost
GeoPoll also looked at those who reported they had not found the goods they were looking for on their last shopping trip. Of those who didn’t find what they were looking for, cost and lack of availability were the most cited reasons in every country.

Finally, we asked if respondents thought they would spend more if they had access to a wider variety of goods from other countries, and found respondents were unsure of how their spending would change. This data is extremely valuable for anyone interested in fast moving consumer goods in Africa and how trade policies are impacting consumers in three countries with rapidly growing middle classes.

To run your own mobile survey through GeoPoll, click below to set up a GeoPoll On Demand account and create and send a survey to GeoPoll’s database of over 200 million respondents.

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