Managed and food-led pubs continue to boost soft drinks sales

27-Mar-2015 - Last updated on 30-Mar-2015 at 08:18 GMT

Britvic led the way in terms of draught formats with value sales of £962m

The value of the soft drinks market to the leisure sector grew in 2014 at £4.2bn, with volumes increasing 0.5%, according to the Britvic Soft Drink Review 2015.

Food-led outlets continue to be “the area of strongest growth for soft drinks consumption”, the report says, with sales growing 3.6% by value to reach more than £4.2bn.

The report, which uses figures from CGA, says: “2014 saw the increase in the ‘weekend millionaire’ phenomena, with more and more consumers choosing to live frugally during the week, but spend on indulgent experiences at the weekend. Although the overall frequency of eating and drinking out declined, spend per meal occasion rose with key audiences, particularly amongst the 18-24 year olds and 65-69 year olds, creating additional opportunities for soft drinks consumption.”

Managed pubs were particularly successful at holding steady in the face of changing consumer spending, largely thanks to the encouragement of promoting all-day-dining and value for money offers. In addition, the subsequent growth of soft drinks in restaurants showed the power of the ‘family pound’”

“Packaged sales continued to lead the way with value sales of £2.2bn, a +4.3% YOY increase and draught sales were close behind, with value sales of £2.1bn and healthy growth of +2.9%.”

“Health and wellbeing continued to be a core purchase driver with consumers, with low or no calorie variants continuing to gather ground. This was reflected in the increased popularity of water on premise, which jumped in value by +26.8% to become the fifth most purchased soft drink, with sales of £296m.”

Category winners

In terms of categories, colas again took the top spot in terms of share at 40%, 2.8% in value to more than £1.7bn and draught variants increased by 2.5% in terms of value to £1.2bn.

Lemonade sales saw a slight decline, dropping -0.1%in value, growth in the previous year, while sales of mixers increased by +12.6% by value as a whole, but varied dramatically with the largest growth for mixers being in restaurants with growth in pubs being “slightly slower”.

Value sales of energy drinks showed serious decline in 2014, falling foul of the nation’s anti-sugar movement, seeing shrinkage of -10.2% in value sales.

Sales of pure juices saw a minimal growth in pubs and clubs +6.7% but pure juice mixers saw decline in value and volume by 0.9%.

Britvic led the way in terms of draught formats with value sales of £962m, compared to Coca-Cola Enterprises £885m