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Demand - real or built up

It was an interesting chat at home while making a shopping list before going to a local supermarket. My better half, as usual, was in command and said "we need to be careful in spending money as there is a slowdown in the economy". I politely nodded my head and toed the line.

Men are very impulsive buyers and I got lured by an attractive offer on bathing soaps. On putting the same in the shopping basked she looked at me as if I was the biggest fool in the world. "Are you even aware that how many soaps are lying at home?"

There was a serious message in there. Most households (by and large in India) hold a lot more than required at home. This, in my opinion, emanated from old experiences of shortage. I dug a few old notes and my past experiences from FMCG market visits. On doing a bit of survey (to camouflage inefficiencies of our house), the results were startling:

On an average (of 4 households that I checked in Metroplitan, nuclear family with two kids, uppermiddle class SEC A1, postgraduate, own a car etc etc) a house hold has at the point

- 21 cakes of soaps
- 2.5 toothbrishes per person
- 2 months usage of tea
- 1.25 months usage of sugar
- 15 days for wheat fluor/rice
- 1 month of other grocery
- 3 months of spices
- 2 years usage for shoes
- 1.75 years of normal clothes
- 3 years of woollens
- 1 year of stationary
- 5 years of music
- 8 years of movies (based on average usage of DVD)
- 10-15 years of utensils
- 2-5 years of crockery
- 5 years usage of postal stamps
- 4 telephone diaries

An eye opener......

And the we say things like space crunch, money shortage etc.

And Indians are considered to be wise spenders.......
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Comments

  1. gunjan7 April 2009 at 13:13

    Yes Indians are comparatively hold more than what is required than non Indians but then it largely depends on two factors which are :
    1.Whether it is a nuclear (as you have also mentioned above)or a joint family with working youth wherein you dont need to store so much in stock for emergency.
    2.Whether the shopping is done by the male (who are more impulsive buyers) or the women in the family (who prepare a list before going for any kind of shooping whether luxury for oneself or grocery for family)
    But then one is also proud of the fact that we indians are like this contributing the growth rate of the Indian economy

    ReplyDelete

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