Manufacturers and retailers of baby products have to work hard to maintain their market share in the face of a dwindling consumer base arising from the falling birth rate. However, some of the factors associated with this demographic trend have been positive for the industry, encouraging higher expenditure per child.
The market for baby transport and nursery furniture has maintained healthy growth in the face of falling numbers of babies. Manufacturers have taken advantage of other demographic trends, including later parenthood, greater affluence among parents, and larger numbers of working mothers, to find ways of persuading parents to spend more on their babies.
The baby feeding equipment market is linked to a number of factors, including the number of mothers who choose to breastfeed. Despite the fact that the Government has recently begun recommending breastfeeding exclusively for the first 6 months, the growing number of working mothers has contributed to the continuing demand for bottle-feeding equipment.
The baby monitors and safety equipment sectors have been boosted by increasing parental recognition of the dangers that may face their babies in their homes. This greater awareness is largely attributable to widespread media coverage, prompted both by safety campaigns and by individual incidents.
The market for disposable nappies has suffered mainly due to the falling birth rate, and the consequent fierce competition among manufacturers and retailers. Despite the development of premium products, and innovations such as disposable trainer pants and 'swimming nappies', growth has been sluggish over the past 5 years.
Key Note's consumer research, conducted by BMRB Access exclusively for this Market Assessment report, indicates that, despite widespread concern about the environmental effect of disposable nappies, a very high proportion of parents of babies and young children under the age of 5 say that they only use disposables. The findings suggest that there might be a fairly high 'drop-out' rate for non-disposable nappies.
Although the vast majority of respondents felt that 'breast is best' for babies, a fairly high proportion also acknowledged that bottle-feeding could be just as good.
Many parents of young children said they found it hard to get unbiased advice about baby equipment, and even more acknowledged that they had bought items of baby equipment that they never, or hardly ever, used.
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