Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso have all announced their withdrawal from ECOWAS
Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso have all announced their immediate withdrawal from the 15 member regional bloc Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). The three countries, all of which are military-led following recent coups, have accused ECOWAS of failing...
The future of alcohol retail in Saudi Arabia
The Saudi government has just announced that the first alcohol retail store in the kingdom will open shortly. The sale of alcohol has been banned in Saudi Arabia since 1952, after an incident that resulted in the murder of a British diplomat. Saudi Arabia, home to...
Kazyon’s growth in Egypt and the future of discount retailers in Africa
A rule Trendtype analysts learned early was that if you want to track supermarket chains in Africa, you had to do it store by store, location by location. It didn’t work to take what supermarkets published at face value: most didn’t keep the information up to date...
Mapping the expansion of the modern trade within African countries
Across African markets, the share of grocery retail sales accounted for by modern trade is still incredibly low, with the notable exception of South Africa, Namibia and SACU markets where South African supermarket retailers Shoprite, Pick n Pay, Spar, Woolworths...
Sweet spots and danger zones for brands in traditional markets
For brand owners in more developed markets like Europe, the primary marketing challenge to brands qua brands is from private label. This challenge comes in many forms and includes the sort of lookalike products favoured by Aldi and Lidl through to private label...
Egypt – economic forecast and the impact in 2024
Egypt is one of Africa’s five benchmark consumer markets (South Africa, Nigeria, Morocco and Kenya) and the largest consumer market in North Africa. It has a population of around 110m and a significant middle class. It is also suffering from severe economic...
Strategic planning for 2024 – what we know
We’re now in Q4, which means most FMCG commercial teams will be doing their strategic planning for 2024, finalising targets and laying the groundwork for a successful year of expansion. Over the past 18 months, Trendtype has worked on strategic planning projects...
Tanzania’s government adopts new measures to protect fx reserves
The Tanzanian Central Bank is buying gold On Monday September 25th 2023 the Central Bank of Tanzania released a public notice announcing the start of its “domestic gold buying programme”. The Friday before, Central Bank president Emmanuel Tutuba had already...
A bad week for retailers in Kenya?
First of all, Twiga Foods, which finds itself being threatened with insolvency by digital services provider Incentro Africa. The debt is nearly $262k. For its part, Twiga considers the move a bad faith attempt to exert pressure while the debt is under dispute. But...
The implications of the coup in Gabon
Our thoughts on the coup in Gabon: too early to say how it will pan out. Ali Bongo was not popular on the street, but international stakeholders valued the stability he brought. If a credible interim leader steps up, we think the coup may well succeed. The coup in...
The implications of the coup in Niger
After the coup in Niger, the Economic Community of West Africa States (ECOWAS) met in Abuja on 30th July 2023 and agreed severe financial sanctions against Niger. These include the closure of borders, and the suspension of all trading and financial transactions...
The dollarization of Zimbabwe’s economy and its impact on FMCG
Retailers are abandoning the New Zimbabwe Dollar Over the course of June 2023, a growing number of Zimbabwean retailers started to price selected items in US$ only. Others maintained prices in local currency, but sharply increased those prices as they started to...
Nigeria free floats the Naira, causing a sharp devaluation
The end of the fixed exchange rate On June 14th 2023 the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) released a press release announcing it would abandon its controlled foreign exchange system in favor of a free-floating one. The declaration has been followed by a depreciation...
The implication of Kenya’s Hustlers Fund on trade and digitalisation
Kenya’s Hustlers Fund (aka The Financial Inclusion Fund) was launched in late November 2022. Overall, the aim was that the Kenyan government would disburse KSh50bn ($380m) to Kenyan small businesses over five years as a bottom-up exercise in improving financial...
Where are the fridges in Africa?
Less than 30% of households across Africa have a refrigerator While mobile phone ownership is at more than 86%, fridge ownership across much of Africa remains low. For many of these households, a fridge is a low priority, big ticket expense. Ownership of a fridge...
Cairo’s food truck boom and the future of fast food
Cairo's fast food scene is the most developed in Africa, apart from South Africa. Egypt is one of only four markets in Africa with a McDonald's franchise, for example (the others are South Africa, Morocco and Mauritius). Local fast food options like koshari,...
Where are the key grocery retail battlegrounds in Africa?
For more than a decade, the race among grocery retailers to establish and grow their store footprints across Africa has been ongoing. Most casual observers know about Shoprite – which has stores in 14 countries, and Walmart and Casino, which are each in 13...
Rethinking strategic market planning – measure the metrics that matter
It’s that time of year when FMCG companies enter the planning phase. The most common questions we hear are: Which are the fastest-growing markets? What is the size of the prize? How big is the outlet universe? Who are my main competitors? These are all...
DP World’s acquisition of Imperial Logistics will transform distribution in Africa
DP World has announced plans to buy South Africa’s Imperial Logistics for $890m, a move that will transform the distribution landscape in Africa. It has offered a 40% premium on Imperial Logistics’ last closing price. The deal, which is expected to close in Q1...
The fluidity of informal intra-regional trade in Central Africa
We've been thinking about the fluidity of informal intra-regional trade in Central Africa. We were particularly interested in how goods flow out of Pointe Noire, The Republic of Congo, and the links to Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of Congo. When we think...
What unrest in South Africa means for distribution
Unrest in South Africa as a result of the imprisonment of former president Jacob Zuma has focused attention on supply chain disruption. Zuma’s home province is KwaZulu-Natal, home to the largest and busiest port in sub Saharan Africa, Durban. Retail businesses have...
Uganda-Kenya milk dispute shows limits of regional trade integration
most integrated in Africa. In practice, the trade war being waged by Kenya on Uganda’s dairy sector shows the work needed to be done before frictionless regional trade becomes a reality. In 2018, Ugandan milk exports to Kenya were worth $80m. In 2020, this fell to...
Why we don’t trust AT Kearney’s Global Retail Development Index and neither should you
The problem is retail development rankings are useless. Worse than useless, actually. We explain why we don’t trust AT Kearney’s Global Retail Development Index when it comes to Africa. A few years ago we wanted to build a retail market attractiveness...
What does it mean to distribute products in Africa?
One of the key issues Trendtype works with in African markets is how distribution works. Literally: how products get into markets, who does the moving, how that affects their price, where the products go, what type of stores they go into, how far do they make it...
The Africa Continental Free Trade Agreement is set to come into force
The Africa Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) has now been ratified by 22 countries, meeting its minimum threshold to come into force. It will create the world’s largest free trade zone, covering 1.2bn people and a combined GDP of $2.5 trillion. Nigeria,...