Industry’s Cost for Unsaleables Rises
By George Anderson
The cost of unsaleables rose from $2.5 billion to $2.6 billion last year, according
to the newly released 2003 Unsaleables Benchmark Report.
The research sponsored by Food Marketing Institute (FMI) and Grocery Manufacturers
of America (GMA) found that drug stores have a significantly higher rate of
unsaleables than supermarkets.
According to numbers on the Supermarket News’ Web site, manufacturer
costs for unsaleables in the drug channel were 2.57 percent of sales compared
to 1.31 percent in supermarkets. Both figures are higher than the 1.18 percent
of sales reported overall.
Moderator’s Comment: Are there significant opportunities
to reduce unsaleables? Why is their such a difference in unsaleables between
retail channels? [George
Anderson – Moderator]