Diet Aids Carry Weight With H&BA Consumers

Diet aids, ethnic and professional hair care products, eye care and new products with an “environmental” positioning were among the categories that enlivened health & beauty aids sales last year and are expected to continue stimulating sales in an otherwise sluggish H&BA department this year.

The environmental push is expected to continue to change the face of the H&BA department as new suppliers such as Bio Pure and existing suppliers like Conair develop lines to exploit growing consumer demand for biodegradable and “natural” products. Incontinence products, eased into assortments gradually over the past couple of years is no longer being coupled with feminine hygiene products. Instead, this merchandise is frequently positioned near the pharmacy or in the vicinity of denture cleaners to reflect the evolution of the product area into its own subcategory.

Aggressive advertising by leading suppliers that speak directly to the consumer by using a representative within the user’s peer group, has helped dissolve the stigma surrounding these products. Incontinence products, sonic denture cleaners like those by Denta Plus, and other products are just the start of an H&BA section devoted to the aged.

At the other end of the age spectrum, children’s H&BA products grew in response to new licensing in the category by Johnson & Johnson and Ducair. The latter has developed a broad spectrum of children’s products including bubble bath, bath toys and crayons, and other grooming aids.

Diet products were the star of the health & beauty aids department last year and will continue to generate high volume due to larger space commitments to the category coupled with aggressive advertising, especially of Slim Fast by Thompson Medical.

John Martin, senior vp, merchandising at Boston Distributors, Maple Heights, Ohio, said his company experienced very high double-digit volume growth in diet aids. New product introductions by Thompson, including individual Slim Fast packets and premixed canned Slim Fast (to be introduced in October) will lead to even higher sales levels in 1991.

Boston Distributors makes shipments of health & beauty aids and other products to over 1,500 stores, predominantly on the East Coast.

Eye care products for contact lens wearers continued to be a high-volume product area at Boston Distributors, Martin noted. Aggressive marketing efforts by disposable contact lens manufacturers does not appear to have made any impact on sales of cleaners and other products geared toward the non-disposable lens wearer.

The steady rise in the number of black and other ethnic consumers continued to be translated into greater sales of ethnic hair care products in markets affected by this demographic shift. Dollar store operators such as Family Dollar, Dollar General and Bill’s Dollar Stores, which more often are located in markets with large black communities, reaped the benefits of spending on ethnic products.