Reliance Retail enters general trade with its own FMCG grocery brands

In the non-foods space, it has entered the personal care and home care business

Reliance Retail has entered the Indian fast-moving consumer goods space as it takes its private label brands, sold at its supermarkets and hypermarkets, Reliance Fresh and Reliance Smart, to general trade. The company had internally set a target of Rs 50,000 crore turnover from the FMCG business, which will fall under Reliance Retail’s consumer brand division.

Business Standard accessed a presentation which includes the brands it has taken to the general trade.

The products which it plans to sell range from groceries like pulses and grains, edible oils, flour, dry fruits, spices, pickles, pastes, idli dosa batter, snacks which include biscuits, namkeens and sweets, ready-to-cook meals, ketchup, jams, carbonated drinks, fruit juices, breakfast cereal, oats, muesli, honey, sauces, tea and coffee in the foods space. Brands which are in the food space include Good Life, Best Farms, Desi Kitchen, Snac Tac, Yeah!, Healthy Life, Aw So Yum, Aarambh, Kaffe.

In the non-foods space, it has entered categories like soaps, shower gels, hand wash, face wash, hair oils, talcum powder, sanitisers, sanitary pads, diapers, toothpaste and toothbrush, nail enamel, lipsticks, beauty accessories, hair accessories, daily essentials which include nail clippers and scissors, deodorants. The personal care portfolio includes brands like get real, Safe Lite, Petals, mothercare, Calcident, Glimmer, Slimmer, Graphite and Jive.

The home care portfolio includes toilet cleaners, floor cleaners, utensil cleaners, glass cleaners, detergents, agarbattis and camphor balls. In homecare, brands which are hitting the shelf include, my home, Enzo, Snug, Shieldz and Samvaad.

Bulk of FMCG products are sold through mom-and-pop stores (over 80 per cent) in the country. The rest is sold through modern trade and ecommerce channels.

The country’s largest retailer had last year made an entry into the general trade with Puric InstaSafe which had a range of personal hygiene and home disinfectants. However, its new set of products will have other brands in the same space, which are have just hit the market under brands such as  get real which has products such as soaps, shower gels and facewash and Safe Life has products like hand washes, hand sanitisers and disinfectant sprays.  

Over a period, the company may come up with stock keeping units (SKU) only for the general trade. Also, manufacturing of these products are outsourced at the moment, according to a source in the know.  

According to a super stockist who has been recently on-boarded in the western region. Reliance Retail has started on-boarding super stockists and distributors in the last two-three months. He added that there are no targets set, but those will kick in next month. He added that the supply chain is still in the process of being set-up. Super stockists are also being incentivised with double margins compared to what other FMCG companies offer. Reliance Retail is currently giving super stockists margins at six per cent. Other FMCG companies margins are in the range of 2.95-3 per cent.

In the April-June quarter, Reliance Retail registered a 114.2 per cent rise in net profit at Rs 2,061 crore for the April-June quarter compared to last year, while its EBIDTA increased 97.7 per cent to Rs 3,837 crore.

The country’s largest retailer's cash profit for the quarter rose 105.2 per cent to Rs 2,873 crore.