The crisis reconfigures the shopping basket: This is how households are shielded against inflation

Spanish families have their own weapons to cushion inflation when going to the supermarket and they are not the same as in the 2009 crisis.

, they are reinventing that crisis consumption.

Although some recipes are known (more white label, cost control...), we see new changes, such as a polarization in consumption, a reinvention of basic products and

.

"These changes are taking place now and we have to see how they evolve in the short term," explains Ángeles Zabaleta, an expert in consumer behavior at Nielsen, who emphasizes that

Nielsen detects

: The rise of the private label (refuge in all crises), spending control (we go with a list and try not to get out of the budget) and more promotional purchases (15% of sales).

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Tips to save: what seasonal foods to buy and how to store them

• Writing: CRISTINA G. LUCIO

• Writing: VIRGINIA HERNÁNDEZ

• Writing: GRACE PABLOS

• Writing: DANIEL IZEDDIN

Tips to save: what seasonal foods to buy and how to store them

"There are changes that are going to be accentuated if the situation continues," says Rosario Pedrosa, an expert in the commercial and marketing area of ​​the employers' association Aecoc.

«Summer has been a parenthesis, because the consumer wanted to disconnect, but

Not all homes are the same, but they all react the same to uncertainty: with restraint », she says.

According to McKinsey,

For 47%, the rise in prices is the main source of concern and 95% have noticed increases.

Changes

Now we go to stores more often and buy less.

Nielsen detects 5% more purchase occasions, but the baskets are emptier: we put about nine products on average, compared to 10 a few months ago.

This means that food waste has been reduced.

"In times of crisis we stretch the products, we lengthen their life cycle, and this is reflected in the reduction in the number of units" explains Zabaleta.

We consume less toothpaste or less shampoo because we run out of bottles.

Ignacio Marcos, a partner at McKinsey, also believes that

since the start of the pandemic, 45% of consumers have changed brands.

"Although price is the main reason behind this change, there are other factors."

«We are doing a different mix of the basket.

We buy in a different way”, agrees Pedrosa.

We fill the basket in a different way:

.

For example, prepared salads.

And vice versa, basics like the frescoes are falling.

"We have become accustomed to certain solutions and now they are essential to us," says Zabaleta.

“We have done a substitution process.

It is true that we are going back to the basics, but these have changed, they are not the same as a few years ago », he says.

Basket

Other categories, such as

"are penalized more, although this is where the discounts come in," he says.

Products such as ice cream, snacks, nuts or packaged bread, "are not essential but before giving up consumption we look for other ways."

Pedrosa believes that there will be a polarization between basic and premium products: within the same range, part of the consumers will go to some and another part to the select ones, "those in the middle, those that are not distinguished by price or value, they will be affected," he says.

The three experts emphasize that we have already come from two years in which we have changed our consumption, due to Covid, and «

».

If in other crises we have seen how we stopped going out to dinner and consumed more at home, in this case, due to the post-pandemic effect, this is not the case.

"Going outside has been one of those new basics," says Zabaleta.

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