What are FMCG?

Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) are the products which are used or sold quickly. They include products such as soaps, toothpastes, cold drinks, batteries, paper products etc.

FMCG don’t give the manufactures a big profit per unit of the product, but because the quantities in which they are sold and bought are large, the combined profit turns out to be significant. Moreover, the fact that FMCG products are exhausted quickly makes the business more attractive.

The FMCG have been around for a long time but the term that was coined by some marketing gurus later caught on. The boundary that defines FMCG products isn’t really sharp. For example, some people consider cigarettes to be a FMCG product while others don’t have the same opinion. Similarly, in the United Kingdom even a refrigerator is considered an FMCG product.

One can simply think of FMCG as associated with non-durable goods and in a way, medicines also fall in this category. There are also products which, to our surprise, are FMCG goods. They include trendy mobile phones, laptops and other flashy electronic items. It is because every few months, customers have newer and better versions of the showy electronic items that they already own, coming into the market, bewitching the customers into buying them.

The Industry:
The competition in the FMCG industry in no less than that in that any other industry one can name. The FMCG industry alone makes up 5% of New Zealand’s GDP. In India, the FMCG sector is expected to grow by 60% this year. The FMCG market is already the fourth largest market in India.

What creates the potential for FMCG is the low operating cost, strong distribution networks along with the growing population, which the industry regards as a potential market.

Taking all these factors into account, and the presence of giants such as Hindustan Unilever, Godrej, Nestle, Parle etc the number of people required to run this industry is also going to shoot up in the coming years.