In a well balanced (inflation stable) effectively functioning economy anywhere, retail supermarkets provide a solid coveted route to market for suppliers and manufacturers. Any serious supplier or manufacturer worth their salt must at some point find a footing in the lucrative retail shelves. This is an important route to growth and expansion.
In Zimbabwe the most sort after shelf space is in top retail supermarkets namely that of OK Zimbabwe and TM PnP. Between the two of them is a solid and far reaching branch network in excess of a combined 100 stores across the country and SKU running into tens upon tens of thousands.
Virtually any small or emerging business in the Fast-Moving Customer Goods (FMCG) sector that I have come across dreams of listing products with OK Zimbabwe or TM PnP. This has been the case for decades because of the guaranteed visibility and market reach afforded by the highly efficient supermarket retail system.
For the most part in the normal conduct of business of retail chains, a delivery to any one of these supermarket chains is a sale whether or not the supermarket itself succeeds in selling the supplied goods to the consumer at the end of the day.
In other words, for most supply trade agreements, the supermarket already owes you on delivery even before the product finds itself on the shelf let alone in consumer hands!
Product listing in top Zimbabwe retail supermarkets such as OK Zimbabwe and TM PnP is not an easy undertaking. This is why the current (October 2018) shortages and empty shelves as was the case back in 2008 present the best opportunity to get products listed.
In fact, in the last several days leading up to this article, our business a manufacturing company, successfully listed an additional line of product under our brand in a very competitive category with one of the two supermarkets. This was after nearly two years of trying without much success. Before that, a good range of our other products that we have been selling in the last decade got listed into the retail system during the shortages of 2008!
The reason why listing new products is difficult during normal operating periods is that competition is stiff and generally shelves are crowded with similar products. There is just so much of variety consumers and the supermarkets themselves can take. When goods are in short supply, the opportunity to list generally swings wide open for fast movers.
If this topic is of particular interest/or if you require more detailed insight feel free to get in touch.