The turnover of organised food retailing showed a positive trend of 3.6% for the whole of 2024. As the latest NielsenIQ measurement data shows, last year total supermarket sales rose to €14.8 billion, with inflationary pressures easing and increased demand being the almost exclusive driver of growth in the sector.

According to NielsenIQ, in terms of demand and price level, 2024 was characterised by the different dynamics of Food and Beverage, compared to the major Non-Food categories.

Specifically, the 4.7% increase in sales for Food and Beverages to 4.7% was primarily due to increased demand, with price changes also contributing positively to this trend. On the contrary, the more moderate positive trend (1.4%) of the categories related to Personal Care & Hygiene, as a whole, was exclusively due to increased demand, while the categories related to Household Care showed a decrease in turnover, compared to 2023, as the increased demand of these categories, at 2.6%, was not able to reverse their strong deflationary trend (-3.8%).

At the same time, NielsenIQ, with the ongoing aim of providing the market with quality data as quickly as possible and monitoring the rising trend of online sales for food retailers, now has an Online Index consisting of specific retailers.

So based on this index, online turnover reached €278 million in 2024, showing an impressive double-digit growth rate of +21%, five times higher than the corresponding growth rate of the physical stores of the participating retailers in the index.

Nevertheless, although steadily increasing, the contribution of online sales to total turnover remains low, reaching 3.1% last year.