Patanjali, the one-time market driver in India’s ayurvedic products segment🌿 has lately experienced a major fall⤵️ in its sales.
In fact, this slowdown of Baba Ramdev’s company has also pulled back the growth of ☝️the overall segment itself.
It comes at a time when FMCG companies have been flooding⏩ the market shelves with natural or herbal products.
The Details
Patanjali, which has challenged🤺 multinationals’ dominance in the consumer segment, saw its sales fall down📉 by 14% from January till June.
During this period, the overall sales of ayurvedic products grew 2% in volume while the overall FMCG segment expanded↔️ by 3%.
This has happened for the first time that the market for natural products, grew slower than the overall FMCG segment.
Notably, during the previous years, the average growth rate* of the former has been twice🤟 than that of *the latter.
Personal care goods🧼 which make up 86% of the total ayurvedic products sales grew only at 5% during the first half of this year.
Meanwhile, the household products which form the rest, saw a huge 13% drop😖 in sales.
About past heroics
Over the past couple of years, the market for natural products has expanded, primarily because of Patanjali’s aggressive approach✊.
During this time, Hindustan Unilever relaunched Ayush, launched Citra skincare brand and acquired Indulekha haircare brand💈 to increase its presence in this segment.
Similarly, L’Oréal launched a haircare range under the Garnier Ultra Blends, made with natural ingredients🍀, while Colgate launched natural toothpaste brand, Vedshakti.
It helped such brands in reaching 89% of all Indian households👨👩👦👦, compared to 76%, three years ago.