Fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) companies and consumer durables makers are expecting a boost in sales ahead of the general elections. Sadashiv Nayak, CEO of Big Bazaar and Kamal Nandi, business head and executive vice president at Godrej Appliances, shared their views on consumption pattern ahead of elections.

“Anything which creates buzz in the country has always helped modern retail, helped Big Bazaar and helped many of our formats. I see elections in the same space, I think it gets families together, it gets everyone together. I would say along with elections there is one more significant thing happening in the next quarter, that is IPL. So anything which creates buzz for us is good. Consumption definitely tends to pick up there, more occasions are getting created, our fashion and snacking business goes into a very positive space upward of double-digit growth. So anything which creates buzz is good for us,” said Nayak on Friday.

In terms of how the spending is shaping up in FMCG space, Nayak added, “We are seeing a very buoyant spending pattern especially in the food, daily necessities and the grocery space. The fashion spending also is extremely robust with categories like kids apparel going upwards of 25 percent. So overall we are seeing a very positive space. There are certain categories like durables, which could have been better but even there, we have nothing to complain, customers have been blessing us with good sales. I see a very different pattern – things like small towns and certain suburbs of cities, they are discovering a new normal, a new high and we have stopped looking at growth numbers there. It is defining a new pattern, a new high which we are going to achieve. So overall a very positive pattern. We are not experiencing any kind of headwinds otherwise.”

“Specifically for our industry of appliances, I think more than election, the weather plays a big role and we are expecting good summer this year and I am sure that is going to definitely boost consumption in a big way. Though delayed, I think it will be an elongated summer and the temperatures are expected to be pretty high. So we definitely expect very high consumption of cooling categories this summer,” Nandi said.

Talking about the slowdown in the consumer durable space, Nandi said, “There has been slowdown and largely that we have seen in the last one year because of the weather not being okay for us, at the same time there has been little bit of uncertainty in terms of the overall economy, thereabout prices going up and that has impacted a lot of purchase sentiments. Going forward, clearly we see the sentiments to improve, to be more positive, given that the whole equations are panning out in the economy, I think there will be more positivity and that should drive higher consumption and also this year all projections are that the weather will be good, the temperatures will be high, so cooling consumption will go up for sure.”