Sweet Success: Poland’s Thriving Confectionery Market

Monday, 29 January, 2024 Food From Poland 42/2024
Cakes, gingerbread, wafers, gum, chocolate, challah, sesame seeds, wine gums, dragees... confectionery is an extensive category in Poland. There are many types available to satisfy a wide variety of tastes. And there are around 150 manufacturers (this is how many companies have achieved a numerical distribution of at least 5%) to this number must of course be added the many small, local manufacturers. And some 10,000 specific products have reached the above distribution level.
This wide choice translates into more than 6,000,000 transactions every day and around 250,000 per hour throughout the year (figures for the total market: small-format shops up to 300 m2, supermarkets, discount shops, hypermarkets). On average, a single transaction contains just over two different packages of sweets, i.e. around 10,000 packages of sweets are sold per minute.

The significant number of transactions translates into a high market value of around PLN 20 billion per year. During the first 9 months of 2023, compared to the first 9 months of 2022, the value of the market increased by around 10% (total sales in the following channels: small format shops up to 300 m2, supermarkets, discount shops, hypermarkets). In contrast, the number of transactions fell slightly by 1%.

The five largest market segments are biscuits (value shares of 20%), chocolates (value shares of 13%), pralines (value shares of 12%), chocolate bars (value shares of 9%) and wine gums and marshmallows (value shares of 6%). However, in the first 11 months of the current year, the value shares of pralines declined and the other categories mentioned above were stable or increased. On the other hand, functional bars + 70%, flavoured jellies + 29% and chewing gums + 9% all recorded increases in value.

According to CMR, the largest market value is attributable to discounters 46%. A third goes to small format shops up to 300 m2, 15% to supermarkets and around 7% to hypermarkets. Each of these sales channels is characterised by different conditions.

In the channel comprising the smallest shops up to 300 m2, impulse sweets are more important. In supermarkets, on the other hand, biscuits are the number one confectionery product in terms of transaction volume, with one out of every five packages sold being biscuits.

The width of the shelf also varies. In small-format shops, the consumer has a choice of around 220 variants of sweets, and this has increased by up to 6 variants over the last year. The largest choice concerns biscuits (54 variants), chocolate bars (24 variants) and chocolates (27 variants). In supermarkets, the consumer will find around 630 variants. The largest number of biscuits is more than 150, chocolates around 85 and pralines around 60. The widest choice is in the largest shop format, i.e. hypermarkets: by far more than 1,000 products. As in the previous channels, the number one category in terms of the number of variants is biscuits: around 220 variants, followed by chocolates 160 and pralines 130.

Przemysław Bojanowski
CMR Data Analyst




tagi: food market , sales , trade , consumer , FMCG , wholesale , retail , food products , news , new products , food industry , retail chains , grocery stores , Poland ,