2020 was indeed a year like never before. When the pandemic hit, many in the industry were thrown off balance. Nevertheless, human resilience took over and we were able to find our way to deal with it.
In Indonesia, we saw many FMCG brands thrive by developing conscious consumer-focused strategies to be relevant at this uncertain time. They responded to the ever-evolving needs of consumers; namely needs around health and hygiene, the higher incidence of in-home cooking, the role of big packs and consumers’ desire to indulge themselves during the stay-at-home period.
Let’s take a look at the list of Indonesia’s Most Chosen brands of 2020. These brands have successfully expanded their CRP (Consumer Reach Points) by increasing their consumer base. And let’s learn from them, and apply Worldpanel’s 5 Levers for Growth across all of our brands.
Indonesia
It will come as no surprise that food and cooking aid brands dominate the top positions in the 2020 ranking. As Indonesian consumers spent more time at home and dined out less they had more cooking occasions, which drove the relevance of packaged food and cooking preparation brands.
Indomie remains Indonesia’s most chosen brand. This reflects its success in reaching the highest buyer base and also being purchased most often, which illustrates the extent to which consumers across all demographics depend on Indomie’s products. Despite already having a very high buyer base, the brand has still been able to attract an additional 1.4 million households over the past year. Local manufacturer Wings has managed to secure places for two of its brands in the Top 10: So Klin and Mie Sedaap. So Klin addressed consumers’ rising concerns around hygiene during the pandemic through communication and products that offered assurance to protect the whole family. Meanwhile, Mie Sedaap took advantage of the upward momentum in in-home eating occasions, especially in urban areas.
Buyer acquisition was the key growth driver for Indonesia’s Top 10 fastest rising brands in 2020. These brands were able to stay relevant to consumers throughout the year, and get chosen again and again.
Riding the hygiene trend during the pandemic led to personal care brand Nuvo achieving the highest growth in CRP. Nuvo successfully attracted more than five million households across Indonesia through communications campaigns that focused on protection against germs and bacteria. Nuvo also offers lower prices compared to other brands, making its products accessible to more consumers.
Since consumers have spent more time at home, they have been cooking more often. This has driven high growth for food preparation brands such as Migelas and Sasa. Migelas offers affordability, with the price point of around IDR 1,000 per sachet, which has helped it to expand its buyer base by 2.7 million households – in particular among SES Mid-Low who were more cautious about spending during the pandemic.
Sasa successfully generated growth across cooking aid categories including MSG, meal makers and coconut milk, attracting more than 2.5 million households in 2020. In addition to new communications designed to appeal to younger consumers the brand regularly shares innovative recipe ideas that extend beyond Indonesian cuisine.
Instant coffee brands dominate the beverage sector, with Kapal Api as the most chosen brand. As a heritage brand, Kapal Api has a large buyer base and high consumer loyalty. Outside the coffee brands, Aqua ranks fifth in the Top 5 as it continues to communicate the importance of staying well-hydrated. Aqua also benefited from the increase in ‘stay-at-home’ moments, especially its gallon pack type which has gained an additional 1.2 million households over the last year.
Rising health concerns led to growth for brands in the dairy categories. In liquid milk, Indonesian households are moving towards bigger pack sizes to accommodate increased family consumption. As one of the leading dairy brands, Frisian Flag demonstrated a strong performance in 2020, attracting nearly one million new buyers, with growth driven by its family packs and innovation in larger-sized ready to drink milk. Outside of the liquid milk category, ice cream brand Aice has benefited from a rise in at-home indulging occasions.
Instant noodles, cooking aids and biscuit brands are at the top of Indonesia’s food sector ranking, impacted by an increase in ‘stay-at-home’ moments that have driven more cooking and snacking occasions. Instant noodles remained a staple category for Indonesian households, especially during the pandemic when consumers’ spending was squeezed. Cooking aid brands also gained relevance, with Royco and Masako among the Top 5. Consumers want to ensure the quality of their food, and they are also becoming more experimental, so they are preparing their meals from scratch.
Maintaining high levels of hygiene at home became a crucial factor during the pandemic, and the importance of home care products is reflected within the sector’s growth. Moving up the ranking to the top position, So Klin (+1.1 million buyers) from Wings is now the leading brand in home care. Its TVC campaign released at the end of 2020 featured a collaboration with UNICEF to promote hygiene and clean water distribution within Indonesia. Unilever’s Molto brand managed to acquire 762,000 more buyers than last year.
As Indonesians stayed indoors, they indulged their personal care needs in the comfort of their own homes. This resulted in higher spending and consumption across the category. Brands with health-related benefits like Lifebuoy (+1 million buyers) and Nuvo (+5.1 million buyers) achieved vast growth during 2020 as Indonesians continued to follow new hygiene habits.
Top CRP gainer in Home Care
Through successfully satisfying consumers’ health and hygiene demands during the pandemic, Mama-Wings managed double-digit growth in 2020. It accomplished this by expanding its buyer base, as well as generating more purchase occasions, which indicates that consumers find the brand highly relevant.
Understanding that consumers are more cautious in their spending, Mama’s offering in the affordable dishwashing space matches shoppers’ needs and wallets. Promotion is also well supported, which has helped Mama to become a brand that shoppers choose time and time again. Mama’s antibacterial variant also taps into an opportunity created by consumers’ changing behaviours when they’re preparing meals. One of the ways they have enhanced their hygiene habits is by washing fresh produce, and Mama has gained strength in the market by communicating the message that it is ‘safe for fruit and veg’.
Spokesperson Albert Dinata, Marketing Director, Consumer Acquisition & Retention at PT. Sasa Inti
How will Sasa remember the year 2020? It was a truly challenging year for us, and I’m sure Sasa is not alone in that; other brands in the industry feel the same way too.
Our biggest challenge was meeting the changing needs of households in Indonesia, which affected the bigger picture, and our economy went down especially in the second quarter. At that time people were in pessimistic mode due to the risk of losing their jobs, and were more cautious with their spending. This impacted the FMCG industry in terms of consumption; for example, in Sasa, we have this business line of food service which was highly impacted when mobility restrictions were put in place.
But worry not, with every challenge comes an opportunity – and in-home consumption presented a major one. We saw that households spent more time at home during the pandemic, and took the opportunity to get closer to them. People who were able to work from home were experimenting more with their cooking, and also took the state of their health more seriously. Knowing this gave us the chance to become Indonesian households’ choice when it came to cooking up delicious meals that would support the family’s health.
What did you do differently during the pandemic, to continue to reach consumers? And what did that enable you to do in the evolving environment of COVID-19? One of the main things we did was boost our presence in ecommerce. Even though we were already doing this before the pandemic, we drove the channel further by making sure we were available across all ecommerce platforms in Indonesia. This was complemented by our strong digital presence throughout the pandemic. We decided to tap into the digital content boom – for example with streaming – on the basis of the insights we collected. We also did regular brand health checks with Kantar, in order to be on top of our game among the competition and stand out from the crowd.
The other thing we saw as an opportunity to reach consumers was showing that Sasa was there with them, especially during the stay-at-home and work-from-home period. It made sense to demonstrate our commitment through TV placements, as people were spending more time at home. This also aligned with Sasa’s commitment to support all Indonesians and help them come through this challenging situation.
What’s been the key to Sasa’s consistent success over the past few years? We’re trying to reach both new and existing consumers in a way that’s different from other brands. While others communicate with their consumers by selling their products, we try to do more than that, by taking a lifestyle-based approach. Other seasoning brands out there usually present themselves as a family brand, but we know that our consumer base extends beyond this segment, so we also approach millennials and gen Z, who make up almost 60% of Indonesia’s total market.
Millennials and gen Z have a clear preference for their products of choice. They are fond of brands that value them as consumers; one of the best ways to reach them is by telling a story about reaching your dreams and aspirations through cooking.
As a heritage brand which is widely known as an MSG producer, we want to be relevant to millennials and gen Z as they are our current and future consumers. In the spirit of being authentic and meaningfully different, we are turning the idea of being the ‘MSG generation’ from a relatively negative notion into a positive one. To achieve this we’re implementing a principle that we apply to all our communications – UAT+E, which stands for Unique, Authentic, Talkable and Entertaining – along with relevant cues, such as using an anime theme in our new seasoned flour campaign and employing the taglines ‘MSG Swag Generation’ and ‘Anything is Possible’. By encouraging them to be proud of their generation, we’re trying to secure an irreplaceable position in their lives with the message that Sasa is supportive of their dreams and aspirations.
In an effort to keep our authenticity and ‘local essence’, we’re speaking to the wider audience through our From Indonesia to The World campaign, bringing out the spirit of Indonesia’s wisdom and combining it with global thinking.
Our strategies are designed to deliver our ultimate goal: transforming our company from an MSG firm into a kitchen food brand.
How have you seized the growth opportunities for Sasa during this pandemic and beyond? First and foremost, in addition to our strengthened ecommerce presence, we provided door-to-door delivery via simple methods such as WhatsApp chat to enable everyone to order our products. Our priority is to bring our products closer to our consumers.
Innovating across categories is also one of Sasa’s goals. We launched seasoned flour and packaged coconut cream that included vitamins, minerals and fibre to bring health benefits. We are the only brand to have done this in Indonesia.
Sasa’s innovation does not stop with our products; we always try to find new ways to tap into emerging trends. By equipping ourselves with strong consumer insights we can be agile when it comes to communicating with our consumers. We’re maintaining a solid presence not only in ‘status quo’ media (free to air TV, OOH and digital) but also in contemporary channels such as OTT streaming, video on demand and podcasts, by engaging with and being endorsed by suitable KOLs.
We have also carried out CSR (corporate social responsibility) activities to get closer to our consumers. Two of the initiatives we ran early in the pandemic were Sasa Got Your Back, when we distributed a package of face masks, sanitisers and a range of our products so people could cook delicious meals for the family, and Eat Stay Love which captured the trend of cooking at home.
These efforts have successfully boosted our KPIs in brand health and brand equity. We not only managed to retain our loyal consumers but also acquired new households despite the pandemic.
What do you believe the FMCG market opportunities and concerns within your category will be in the coming months (short-term) and in the long-term? In order to look for opportunities, you first need to do your homework: collect your insights, do a regular brand health check, see what’s going on around your consumers and find out whether you are going into the right direction.
Then you can identify your source of business; for example, here at Sasa, it’s household and food service. With the mobility restrictions in place during the pandemic, household consumption was the principal driver of growth. But we haven’t overlooked the growth potential of food service or out-of-home consumption: the vaccination programme is in progress, the level of confidence among consumers is recovering and out-of-home consumption is starting to rebound.
While you are recovering from the hit you took during the pandemic, retaining your buyers and acquiring new buyers are equally important. Sasa plays across categories, which helps us to maintain growth in both types of buyers.
To conclude, I’d say don’t lose hope in a pandemic where the finish line doesn’t seem to be arriving quickly. The pandemic is only a bad thing if we can’t see the opportunities within the situation.
