GGM/HBC: BAD NEWS, GOOD NEWS

Many traditional health and beauty care and general merchandise categories continue to bedevil supermarkets. With Wal-Mart and other mass merchandisers, along with drug stores and the value channel chipping away at sales, all five of the largest nonfood categories showed single-digit decreases. External factors impacted the list of top sales decliners as digital camera use ate into photographic supplies, casual office dress caused pantyhose/nylons to decline, while the methamphetamine laws controlling the ingredient pseudoephedrine drove sales of cold/allergy/sinus liquids down. Two sales decliners from last year, suntan products and candles, shifted to the top of the sales gainers list. Meanwhile, SN gathered information on some categories not tracked by IRI, and found five categories - pharmacy, fuel, gift cards, magazines and greeting cards - that are all over $1 billion, ranking higher than IRI's top nonfood categories. Prescription sales alone were a $27.6 billion business in 2005, according to the National Association of Chain Drug Stores, and the sales growth of fuel and gift cards has been well documented. Seasonal is another area seeing strong sales growth in excess of traditional HBC/GM categories.