3. Electronic point of sale data
3.8 Trends in nominal average sales price-per-unit
This section examines changes in the nominal average sales price-per-unit (GBP, £*). Data are cross-tabulated by product category (Table 3.10). In each category, net
changes are presented across the three study periods, year-on-year (i.e. before and after MUP implementation), and across the 18 months. Data are also presented in a time series figure to show to what extent changes intersected with MUP
implementation (Figure 3.7†,‡). Time series figures showing trends by retailer SIMD
are also reported in Annex Three, and are referred to in the main text.
We highlight increases in the nominal average sales price-per-unit for four product categories after MUP implementation: cider non-multipacks, cider multipacks, perries, and beer non-multipacks. There were smaller increases across other remaining product categories, albeit none appeared to be pronounced around, or related to, MUP implementation.
The largest observed increase in nominal average sales price-per-unit was for cider non-multipacks, both year-on-year (+104.1%, from £0.28-per-unit to £0.58-per-unit) and across the 18 months (+97.4%, from £0.28-per-unit to £0.56-per-unit). The increase mostly occurred in period two (+129.6%), and coincided with MUP
implementation. This is consistent with expectations that UPCs in this category, such as large container sizes of higher-strength ciders, would likely be highly affected by MUP. The time series figures reported in Annex Three suggests that stepped price increases around MUP implementation occurred consistently across retailer SIMD quintiles. The 50 tracked products (Annex One) provides evidence of the increase in
* Prices are unadjusted for inflation.
† The ‘other’ product category is not reported in the time series as it is only a small category
of miscellaneous products with limited study relevance.
‡ The category averages for multipacks (e.g. beer, cider, RTD) excludes cases in which the
multipack was sold as separate products. These are instead included in the price distribution analysis (3.2.8).
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price-per-unit happening at a brand level, with examples of Frosty Jack’s and Strongbow Original 5.0% discussed in the case studies in Sections 6.2 and 6.4. We also observed an increase in the nominal average sales price-per-unit for
perries, both year-on-year and overall (both +48%, from £0.38-per-unit to £0.56-per- unit). This increase mostly occurred in period two (+51.7%) and coincided with MUP implementation. The time series reported in Annex Three suggests that price
increases around the point of MUP implementation occurred consistently across retailer SIMD quintiles, albeit the increase appeared more gradual among SIMD5 retailers. As Lambrini is the market leader for perries, and represents most of the UPCs in this category, this change is largely accounted for by the increase reported for Lambrini Original in the 50 tracked products (Annex One).
There was also an increase in the nominal average sales price-per-unit for cider multipacks, both year-on-year and across the 18 months (both +18.0%; from £0.47- per-unit to £0.56-per-unit). The largest increase occurred in period two (+17.1%) and coincided with MUP implementation, before remaining relatively stable thereafter. This trend was consistent in most retailer SIMD areas (Annex Three), albeit the increase was more gradual in SIMD5 (vs. an acute change around MUP
implementation among more deprived quintiles). The 50 tracked products show that the increase was more pronounced among some brands than others. For example, while the year-on-year change for multipacks of Strongbow Original 5% was +27.0% (from £0.40-per-unit to £0.50-per-unit), it was smaller for the Strongbow Dark Fruit variant (from £0.63-per-unit to £0.64-per-unit).
We also observed an increase in the nominal average sales price-per-unit for beer non-multipacks, both year-on-year (+24.5%, from £0.53-per-unit to £0.67-per-unit) and overall (+19.4%, from £0.53-per-unit to £0.64-per-unit). Although the time series showed that this increase began earlier in the study period, and appeared to
increase gradually, there was an acute increased in period two (+13.9%) which was pronounced around MUP implementation; this gradual increase and pronounced increase around MUP was broadly consistent across retailer SIMD quintile, albeit it appeared more gradual in SIMD5 (Annex Three). There were only a small number of
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beer non-multipacks in the 50 tracked products, although these largely supported this category-level trend. For example, the nominal average sales price-per-unit for Stella Artois non-multipacks increased +4.1% year-on-year (from £0.61-per-unit to £0.64-per-unit). As the nominal average sales price-per-unit for this category – and many of the 50 tracked products within it – were already above MUP at the start of the study, it is unclear whether this increase was related to MUP.
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Table 3.10: Nominal average sales price-per-unit (£ppu) by product category in the three study periods, year-on-year (Aug 17 – Aug 18) and across the 18 months (Aug 17 – Jan 19)
Product category
Month multipacks Beer multipacks Beer non- multipacks Cider multipacks Cider non- Fortified wine Other Perry multipack RTD multipack RTD non- Spirits Wine
Period 1 (Aug 17 – Jan 18) Ave sales ppu first month
(£) 0.52 0.53 0.47 0.28 0.63 0.79 0.38 1.11 0.82 0.54 0.65
Ave sales ppu last month
(£) 0.53 0.55 0.49 0.27 0.63 0.81 0.37 1.16 0.84 0.55 0.66
Net change (nominal) 0.01 0.01 0.02 0.02 0.00 0.02 0.01 0.05 0.02 0.01 0.00
Net change (%) 1.8 2.3 3.5 -5.7 0.2 2.6 -3.3 4.7 2.8 1.0 0.2
Period 2 (Feb 18 – July 18) Ave sales ppu first month
(£) 0.53 0.57 0.50 0.28 0.64 0.82 0.37 1.16 0.82 0.55 0.66
Ave sales ppu last month
(£) 0.56 0.66 0.58 0.63 0.65 0.82 0.56 1.11 0.85 0.57 0.67
Net change (nominal) 0.03 0.09 0.09 0.35 0.01 0.03 0.19 0.05 0.03 0.02 0.01
Net change (%) 5.7 16.0 17.1 126.9 1.6 3.5 51.7 -4.2 3.8 3.7 1.6
Period 3 (Aug 18 – Jan 19) Ave sales ppu first month
90 Ave sales ppu last month
(£) 0.57 0.64 0.56 0.56 0.66 0.82 0.56 1.14 0.85 0.58 0.67
Net change (nominal) 0.01 0.03 0.0 0.02 0.00 -0.01 0.0 0.00 0.02 0.01 0.00
Net change (%) 0.7 -4.1 -0.6 -3.3 0.4 -0.9 -0.2 0.3 2.3 1.4 -0.1
12 months (Aug 17 – Aug 18) Ave sales ppu first month
(£) 0.52 0.53 0.47 0.28 0.63 0.79 0.38 1.11 0.82 0.54 0.65
Ave sales ppu last month
(£) 0.56 0.67 0.56 0.58 0.66 0.83 0.56 1.14 0.83 0.57 0.67
Net change (nominal) 0.04 0.13 0.09 0.30 0.02 0.05 0.18 0.03 0.01 0.03 0.01
Net change (%) 7.1 24.5 18.7 104.1 3.7 5.9 48.3 2.9 1.1 4.8 2.3
Overall (Aug 17 – Jan 19) Ave sales ppu first month
(£) 0.52 0.53 0.47 0.28 0.63 0.79 0.38 1.11 0.82 0.54 0.65
Ave sales ppu last month
(£) 0.57 0.64 0.56 0.56 0.66 0.82 0.56 1.14 0.85 0.58 0.67
Net change (nominal) 0.04 0.10 0.08 0.28 0.03 0.04 0.18 0.04 0.03 0.03 0.01
Net change (%) 7.8 19.4 18.0 97.4 4.2 4.9 48.0 3.2 3.4 6.3 2.2
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