Consumer Packaged Goods = e-commerce?

What could be more convenient than buying everyday necessities online?
According to AdAge.com  2010 is going to be a big year for e-commerce, particularly for the consumer packaged goods industry. Proctor and Gamble Co. and General Mills both announced last week that they will be expanding their online retail efforts this year, what’s even more significant is that websites such as Alice.com  (launched last summer) are pooling together the efforts of CPG marketers into a single site with a single shopping cart, and free shipping. Alice.com is creating e-stores for 29 marketers and will link them to their brand websites, participants include: Johnson & Johnson, Nestle, Novartis, Bausch & Lomb, General Electric, Sara Lee, and General Mills.

Less obvious reasons for CPG companies to include e-commerce is to develop one on one relationships with consumers, and to enhance company branding. “The point is that we want to be everywhere our consumers want to shop or gain knowledge, and in that sense we have to be ubiquitous … and that requires a big presence in e-commerce,” said P&G Chairman-CEO Bob McDonald in an interview. According to Alice.com CEO Brian Wiegland there is a downfall to CPG companies selling online, Walmart.com for example, added more CPG products to what it sells in the past year. Manufacturers have the power to set prices at Alice, and “no one is coming in lower than Walmart,” said Wiegland. “If you want the absolute lowest prices, you’re still going to find them at Wal-Mart. Target is generally 5% higher than Walmart, and that’s generally where we fall in.” What do you think about this new trend in the CPG industry? Would you purchase shampoo, razors, or toilet paper online? What if you could still buy it for less at Wal-Mart?

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 26th, 2010 at 6:07 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.